DARK Days in the United States
Organic Lifestyle Comments Off on DARK Days in the United States
Thursday, July 23, was a dark day indeed. On that day, 275 members of the U.S. House of Representatives voted in favor of H.R. 1599, the DARK (Deny Americans the Right to Know) Act. By voting for the DARK Act, these politicians voted against truth and transparency, against science, against the more than century-old right of states to legislate on matters relating to food safety and labeling.
The actual name of the Bill is “The Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2015.” It is nothing of the sort. It says that only the Federal Government can pass GMO labeling laws. And that the laws will be voluntary, not mandatory. And that any food manufacturer using GMOs can opt out of using the labels. So the title of the bill is a giant FU to the 90-percent of Americans who are in favor of mandatory labeling of GMOs.
It seems ironic that in the “land of the free” we cannot democratically oust GMOs, and that our own leaders are now putting up walls to deny us the right to know what is in our food. It really is an abomination and perversion of everything our government “by the people, of the people, and for the people” is supposed to stand for. The passage of the DARK Act in our House of Representatives proves that.
Besides voting for Monsanto and friends, they voted against the producers of non-GMO foods. They voted against “We the people.” The vote included all but a handful of Republicans and 45 Democrats. I suggest you vote them out of office in the next election. No, I think it’s mandatory you vote them out of office in the next election. To do that, you need to know how your representative voted.
You can find out how your representative voted at this link:
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/114-2015/h462
***
BEE-HARMING PESTICIDE ‘UBIQUITOUS’ IN ENVIRONMENT
More than 70 percent of pollen and honey samples collected from foraging bees in Massachusetts contained neonicotinoids, a type of insecticide that has been linked to colony collapse disorder, researchers are reporting. The disorder causes adult bees to abandon their hives in winter.
In the new study, published in The Journal of Environmental Chemistry, researchers analyzed 219 pollen samples and 53 honey samples from 62 hives in 10 counties in Massachusetts. Honeybee colonies have experienced significant losses over the last decade, and the effects can be far-reaching: Bees are the prime pollinators of one-third of all crops worldwide.
The researchers wanted to find out whether neonicotinoids are commonly present in pollen and honey, which are the main food sources for bees. The results show that neonicotinoids are ubiquitous in the environment where bees foraged, and therefore could pose risks to honeybee health.
By the way, when environmentalists approached Bayer AG, the German company that makes the neonicotinoid pesticides, and urged them to stop production because of honeybee deaths and the danger to our food supply from that, Bayer AG refused. I hope the executives at Bayer find their money tasty when all the bees are dead and the pollinated crops disappear.
***
ANOTHER HERBICIDE IS ‘POSSIBLY CARCINOGENIC’
A group of scientists convened by the World Health Organization has decided that 2,4-D herbicide is “possibly carcinogenic.”
The IARC, the World Health Organization’s cancer agency, says that 2,4-D, the GMO industry’s new herbicide of choice to kill glyphosate-resistant weeds in GMO crop fields, is a “possible” human carcinogen. You can read the IARC’s preliminary report here (you’ll need to register for free access):
http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanonc/article/PIIS1470-2045%2815%2900081-9/abstract
According to Mother Jones magazine, “this announcement can hardly be welcome news in the Midwest, where farm fields are blanketed in corn and soybeans. Since the advent of crops genetically engineered to withstand glyphosate in the 1990s, farmers there have come to rely heavily on the herbicide that many weed varieties have evolved to resist, causing many headaches and a surge in herbicide use.
“This past spring, Dow Chemical introduced new genetically modified corn and soybean products designed to solve that problem. They’re engineered to resist not just glyphosate, but also, you guessed it, 2,4-D. And Dow is selling farmers a proprietary herbicide known as Enlist Duo, a combo of glyphosate and 2,4-D, that farmers can apply directly to the crops grown from the new genetically modified corn and soybean seeds. There’s evidence that toxic chemicals do worse things to us when combined than they do solo. That such ‘synergistic’ effects are little studied is hardly comforting.”
***
ROUNDUP 1000X MORE TOXIC THAN GLYPHOSATE ALONE
The Organic Consumers Association reports that Dr. Robin Mesnage of the Department of Medical and Molecular Genetics at Kings College in London, revealed new data analysis showing Roundup is 1,000 times more toxic than glyphosate, its active weed-killing ingredient, alone.
“Glyphosate is everywhere throughout our food chain-–in our food and water. The lack of data on toxicity of glyphosate is not proof of safety, and these herbicides cannot be considered safe without proper testing. We know Roundup…contains many other chemicals which, when mixed together, are 1,000 times more toxic than glyphosate on its own,” Dr. Mesnage said.
In response to the IARC conclusions, Claire Robinson, an editor at GMWatch.org said: “Outside the United Kingdom, the reaction to the WHO IARC report has been dramatic. Some retailers in Switzerland and Germany have removed glyphosate products, France has committed to do so by 2018, and German states are calling for an EU-wide ban. The Danish Working Environment Authority has declared it a carcinogen, El Salvador and Sri Lanka have banned it, and the Colombia government has banned aerial spraying on coca crops.”
***
HUNGARY DESTROYS GMO CORN CROP
Hungary has taken a bold stand against biotech giant Monsanto and genetic modification by destroying 1000 acres of maize found to have been grown with genetically modified seeds, according to Hungarian deputy state secretary of the Ministry of Rural Development, Lajos Bognar.
The GMO maize has been plowed under, said Bognar. Unlike several EU members, GMO seeds are banned in Hungary. During the ministry’s investigation, controllers found Pioneer Monsanto products among the seeds planted.
The free movement of goods within the EU means that authorities will not investigate how the seeds arrived in Hungary, but they will check where the goods can be found, Bognar said. Most farmers complained once they just discovered they were using GMO seeds.
***
WHEN IT COMES TO GMOS, WE SHOULD BE MORE LIKE RUSSIANS
The Vaishnaya Internet News Service (a Russian news service) asks, “Why Is Russia Banning GMOs While the US Keeps Approving Them?”
Unable to resist taking a well-deserved pot-shot at America, the News Service notes that in the U.S., “there have been marches, vocal demonstrations, petitions, and laws banning GMOs, but the US is still lagging in the ‘democratic’ freedoms it has promised its people. Russia, on the other hand, has completely banned GMOs, placing a moratorium on their imports for 10 years. The nation rejects GMOs due to numerous dangers, while the US continues to allow Monsanto, Dow, Bayer, Syngenta, and their bullying kind to contrive a cold war on the American people.”
The VP of Russia’s National Association for Genetic Safety, Irina Ermakova, has said:
“It is necessary to ban GMOs, to impose moratorium (on) it for 10 years. While GMOs will be prohibited, we can plan experiments, tests, or maybe even new methods of research could be developed. It has been proven that not only in Russia, but also in many other countries in the world, GMOs are dangerous. Methods of obtaining the GMOs are not perfect, therefore, at this stage, all GMOs are dangerous. Consumption and use of GMOs obtained in such way can lead to tumors, cancers, and obesity among animals. Bio-technologies certainly should be developed, but GMOs should be stopped. We should stop it from spreading,” Ermakova said.
Here’s another report on the subject, this one from Russian TV: “After US diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks showed that the State Department was lobbying worldwide for Monsanto and other similar corporations, a new report based on the cables shows Washington’s shilling for the biotech industry in distinct detail. The August, 2011, WikiLeaks revelations showed that American diplomats had requested funding to send lobbyists for the biotech industry to hold talks with politicians and agricultural officials in ‘target countries’ in areas like Africa and Latin America, where genetically-modified crops were not yet a mainstay, as well as some European countries that have resisted the controversial agricultural practice.”
It should be noted that what passes for journalism in Russia is really opinion, as in this quote, but in this case, the point is well-taken. Our government is indeed shilling for Big Biotech. Even our universities are in the back pocket of these biotech corporations. The annual $500 million budget of Stanford University’s Department of Biological Engineering alone supports dozens of research projects for myriad commercial (biotech) applications.
***
‘INERT INGREDIENTS’ MAY BE AS TOXIC AS THE ACTIVE ONES
The Environmental Protection Agency endangers public health by refusing to require disclosure of falsely characterized “inert” ingredients in pesticides, environmentalists claim in court, the Organic Consumers Association reports.
Three groups, The Center for Environmental Health, Beyond Pesticides, and Physicians for Social Responsibility have sued the EPA and its Administrator Gina McCarthy in Federal Court on Wednesday, under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA).
“What we’re challenging is EPA’s inaction despite a body of evidence” that inert pesticide ingredients can be just as harmful as active ones, plaintiffs’ attorney Yana Garcia told Courthouse News.
“Chemicals listed as inert are not inert,” she said. “Consumers think the inert ingredients are water or other benign substances used to mix the chemicals, but many are carcinogenic and others have acute impacts and still others have impacts that are currently unknown.”
Though FIFRA includes provisions to protect pesticide manufacturers’ trade secrets, it gives the EPA the authority to disclose ingredients it considers hazardous, Garcia said.
“It remains clear that FIFRA doesn’t let trade secrets trump health. But the EPA is kind of hiding behind this provision in the statute to shirk its responsibility to protect people and the environment” from pesticides, Garcia said.
Pesticide manufacturers and the EPA have identified more than 370 commonly used hazardous inert ingredients, including several known and suspected carcinogens, chemicals that cause reproductive and neurological disorders, and 96 potentially toxic chemicals classified as “high priority for testing,” according to the complaint.
Worse still, the groups say, many of these hazardous ingredients enhance the absorption and inhalation rates of active ingredients, render protective gear such as gloves less effective, and make it difficult to remove pesticides from clothing.
###
