<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:verdana,sans-serif"><br clear="all"></div><div class="gmail_default" style=""><font size="4" face="georgia, serif"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/sep/24/monsanto-weedkiller-harms-bees-research-finds">The Guardian</a><br></font><font color="#444444"><span style="font-family:"Guardian Text Sans Web","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Arial,"Lucida Grande",sans-serif;font-size:12px;font-variant-ligatures:common-ligatures">24 Sep 2018</span> </font> <br><font size="4" face="georgia, serif"><br></font></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:verdana,sans-serif"><div class="gmail-content__headline-standfirst-wrapper" style=""><div class="gmail-content__header gmail-tonal__header" style=""><div class="gmail-u-cf" style=""><h1 class="gmail-content__headline" style="margin:0px;line-height:2.375rem;font-family:"Guardian Egyptian Web",Georgia,serif;font-weight:400;padding:0.1875rem 0px 2.25rem"><font size="6">Monsanto's global weedkiller harms honeybees, research finds</font></h1></div></div><div class="gmail-tonal__standfirst gmail-u-cf" style="font-size:medium"><div class="gmail-content__standfirst" style="font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.375rem;font-weight:700;margin-bottom:0.75rem;padding-left:0px;padding-right:0px;border-top:0px;padding-top:0.125rem;max-width:33.75rem;margin-left:0px"><p style="margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:0.5rem">Glyphosate – the most used pesticide ever – damages the good bacteria in honeybee guts, making them more prone to deadly infections</p><p class="gmail-byline" style="font-size:1rem;font-weight:400;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:0.25rem;line-height:1.25rem;font-family:"Guardian Egyptian Web",Georgia,serif;border-top:0px;color:rgb(199,0,0);font-style:italic;min-height:0px;width:291.906px;padding-bottom:0px"><span style="font-weight:700;font-style:normal"><a rel="author" class="gmail-tone-colour" href="https://www.theguardian.com/profile/damiancarrington" style="color:rgb(199,0,0);background:transparent;text-decoration-line:none">Damian Carrington</a></span> Environment editor</p><div class="gmail-meta__twitter gmail-meta__contact-method" style="display:inline-block;font-size:0.75rem;line-height:1rem;font-family:"Guardian Text Sans Web","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Arial,"Lucida Grande",sans-serif;padding-right:0.625rem"><a href="https://twitter.com/dpcarrington" style="color:rgb(118,118,118);background:transparent;text-decoration-line:none"><span class="gmail-inline-twitter-bird gmail-inline-icon gmail-i-left" style="fill: rgb(118, 118, 118);"> </span>@dpcarrington</a></div><p class="gmail-content__dateline" style="font-weight:400;margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:0.375rem;font-size:0.75rem;line-height:1rem;font-family:"Guardian Text Sans Web","Helvetica Neue",Helvetica,Arial,"Lucida Grande",sans-serif;color:rgb(118,118,118);box-sizing:border-box;padding-top:0.125rem">Mon 24 Sep 2018</p></div></div></div><div class="gmail-content__article-body gmail-from-content-api gmail-js-article__body" style="font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-left:0px;padding-bottom:4.5rem;color:rgb(18,18,18);font-family:"Guardian Text Egyptian Web",Georgia,serif;font-variant-ligatures:common-ligatures"><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">The world’s most used weedkiller damages the beneficial bacteria in the guts of honeybees and makes them more prone to deadly infections, new research has found.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">Previous studies have shown that pesticides such as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jun/29/pesticides-damage-survival-of-bee-colonies-landmark-study-shows" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">neonicotinoids</a> cause harm to bees, whose pollination is vital to about three-quarters of all food crops. Glyphosate, manufactured by Monsanto, targets an enzyme only found in plants and bacteria.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">However, the new study shows that glyphosate damages the microbiota that honeybees need to grow and to fight off pathogens. The findings show glyphosate, the <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/glyphosate-now-most-used-agricultural-chemical-ever-422419" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">most used agricultural chemical ever</a>, may be contributing to the global decline in bees, along with the loss of habitat.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">“We demonstrated that the abundances of dominant gut microbiota species are decreased in bees exposed to glyphosate at concentrations documented in the environment,” said Erick Motta and colleagues from University of Texas at Austin in their new paper. They found that young worker bees exposed to glyphosate exposure died more often when later exposed to a common bacterium.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">Other research, from China and published in July, showed that <a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acs.jafc.8b02212" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">honeybee larvae grew more slowly and died more often</a> when exposed to glyphosate. An <a href="http://jeb.biologists.org/content/218/17/2799" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">earlier study, in 2015</a>, showed the exposure of adult bees to the herbicide at levels found in fields “impairs the cognitive capacities needed for a successful return to the hive”.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">“The biggest impact of glyphosate on bees is the destruction of the wildflowers on which they depend,” said Matt Sharlow, at conservation group Buglife. “Evidence to date suggests direct toxicity to bees is fairly low, however the new study clearly demonstrates that pesticide use can have significant unintended consequences.”</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">Prof Dave Goulson, at the University of Sussex, said: “It now seems that we have to add glyphosate to the list of problems that bees face. This study is also further evidence that the landscape-scale application of large quantities of pesticides has negative consequences that are often hard to predict.”</p><div class="gmail-rich-link gmail-tone-news--item gmail-rich-link--pillar-news" style="background-color:rgb(246,246,246);margin:0px;overflow:hidden"><div class="gmail-rich-link__container" style=""><div class="gmail-rich-link__image-container gmail-u-responsive-ratio" style="width:130px;padding-bottom:78px;overflow:hidden;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0.1)"><img src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/a10d880cb87935cd428a429ecda1dd72168b1d3d/0_78_3690_2214/master/3690.jpg?width=460&quality=85&auto=format&usm=12&fit=max&s=8f3be35bd115c1ec4adc9b09edaaab05" style="border: 0px; width: 130px; height: 78px; top: 0px; left: 0px;"></div><div class="gmail-rich-link__header" style="font-size:0.875rem;line-height:1.125rem;font-family:"Guardian Egyptian Web",Georgia,serif;padding:0.125rem 0.3125rem 0.5em;box-sizing:border-box;min-height:2.25rem"><h1 class="gmail-rich-link__title" style="margin:0px;font:inherit;padding:0px"><a class="gmail-rich-link__link" style="background:transparent;color:inherit">Assumed safety of pesticide use is false, says top government scientist</a></h1></div><div class="gmail-rich-link__read-more" style="padding-left:0.3125rem"><div class="gmail-rich-link__arrow" style="display:inline-block"><span class="gmail-inline-arrow-in-circle gmail-inline-icon" style="fill: rgb(255, 255, 255);"></span></div> <div class="gmail-rich-link__read-more-text" style="font-size:0.875rem;font-family:"Guardian Egyptian Web",Georgia,serif;display:inline-block;height:1.875rem;line-height:1.625rem;padding-left:0.125rem;vertical-align:top;color:rgb(199,0,0)">Read more</div></div><a class="gmail-rich-link__link gmail-u-faux-block-link__overlay" href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/21/assumed-safety-of-widespread-pesticide-use-is-false-says-top-government-scientist" style="background:transparent;color:inherit;text-decoration-line:none;overflow:hidden;text-indent:200%;white-space:nowrap;opacity:0"></a></div></div><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">However, Oliver Jones, a chemist at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, said: “To my mind the doses of glyphosate used were rather high. The paper shows only that glyphosate can potentially interfere with the bacteria in the bee gut, not that it actually does so in the environment.”</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">A spokesman for <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/monsanto" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">Monsanto</a> said: “Claims that glyphosate has a negative impact on honey bees are simply not true. No large-scale study has found any link between glyphosate and the decline of the honeybee population. More than 40 years of robust, independent scientific evidence shows that it poses no unreasonable risk for humans, animal, and the environment generally.”</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">The new research, <a href="http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1803880115" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</a>, found that some of the key beneficial bacteria in bees’ guts have the enzyme that is targeted by glyphosate. It also found that the ability of newly emerged worker bees to develop a normal gut biome was hampered by glyphosate exposure.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">Harm to gut bacteria by glyphosate exposure has also been shown in a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/16/glyphosate-shown-to-disrupt-microbiome-at-safe-levels-study-claims" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">pilot study in rats</a>. “Gut bacteria play a vital role in maintaining good health, in organisms as diverse as bees and humans,” said Goulson. “The finding that these bacteria are sensitive to the most widely used pesticide in the world is thus concerning.”</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">People are known to <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2658306" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">widely consume glyphosate residues</a> in food - such as <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/aug/16/weedkiller-cereal-monsanto-roundup-childrens-food" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">children’s breakfast cereal</a> - but the health impact is controversial. In August a US court ordered <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2018/aug/10/monsanto-trial-cancer-dewayne-johnson-ruling" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">Monsanto to pay $289m in damages</a> after a jury ruled that the weedkiller caused a terminally ill man’s cancer. The company <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bayer-glyphosate-lawsuits/bayers-monsanto-asks-us-court-to-toss-289-million-glyphosate-verdict-idUSKCN1LZ0H7" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">filed papers to dismiss the case</a> on 19 September.</p><p style="margin:0px 0px 1rem;padding:0px">The weedkiller, sold as Roundup, won a shortened five-year lease in the EU in 2017. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/mar/21/roundup-cancer-who-glyphosate-" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">In 2015</a>, the World Health Organisation’s cancer agency, the IARC, declared glyphosate “probably carcinogenic to humans,” although <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/16/glyphosate-unlikely-to-pose-risk-to-humans-unwho-study-says" class="gmail-u-underline" style="background:transparent;color:rgb(171,6,19);border-bottom:0.0625rem solid rgb(220,220,220);text-decoration-line:none">several international agencies</a> subsequently came to opposite conclusions. Monsanto insists glyphosate is safe.</p></div></div><div><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_signature" data-smartmail="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><p><font size="1" face="trebuchet ms, sans-serif"><span style="color:rgb(153,0,0);background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial">================================</span><span style="background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial"><br>
</span><span style="color:rgb(153,0,0);background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial">CHUCK SEARCY<br>President, VFP Chapter 160<br>
International Advisor, Project RENEW<br>
Co-chair, Agent Orange Working Group<br>
71 Trần Quốc Toản<br>
Hà Nội, Việt Nam<br>
Email </span><a href="mailto:chuckusvn@gmail.com" target="_blank"><span style="color:rgb(17,85,204);background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial">chuckusvn@gmail.com</span></a><br>
<span style="color:rgb(153,0,0);background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial">Skype chucksearcy<br>
Cell VN +8 490 342 0769<br>
Cell US +1 404 740 0653<br>
Web </span><span style="color:rgb(17,85,204);background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial"><a href="http://www.landmines.org.vn/" target="_blank">www.landmines.org.vn</a><br></span><span style="color:rgb(153,0,0);background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial">================================</span><font style="color:black"> </font></font></p>
<p style="line-height:115%;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial"><br></p>
<p><span style="font-size:6pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif;color:black;background-image:initial;background-position:initial;background-repeat:initial"> </span></p></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>