Glyphosate News Roundup: Reuter's News Source Faked, German Regulators' Possible Plagiarism, A Professor's Exposé, a French Court's Ban and a Prime Time Debate

France 2 will air a major documentary about the pros and cons of glyphosate Thursday night

It's been an action packed week in the Dept. of News About Glyphosate with five major developments:

1. Was a Reuter's News reporter reporting on the facts? or acting as a puppet promoting Monsanto's point of view? Litigators find new evidence of possible deception and questionable journalistic ethics.

2. Did EU regulators plagiarize Monsanto documents in reviewing the health risks of glyphosate based herbicides? EU members of Parliament say yes, after examining key documents from the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR)

3. In a parallel universe in the U.S. how did IARC find glyphosate to be a probable carcinogen while the EPA did not? One professor's analysis boils down to the data each body considered. With the EPA, Monsanto presented only data from private industry studies; IARC's team of experts looked only at studies that meet peer reviewed scientific journal standards.

4. A French court found that French environmental protections failed to be enforced in the matter of the most widely used weedkiller and banned its use in France effective immediately.

5. France 2 will air controversial documentary on the pros and cons of glyphosate, sparking national debate.

REUTERS: NEW EVIDENCE QUESTIONS REUTERS REPORTER KATE KELLAND'S SOURCES

Lawyers combing through Bayer and Monsanto documents for pending litigation have found new clues that Reuters' top reporter on glyphosate may have been less than honest about her sources when she wrote about Monsanto's herbicides.

Kate Kelland, Reuters

The current court cases pending against Bayer by plaintiffs (who claim that Monsanto's glyphosate based herbicides caused them to get cancer) have turned up evidence that revises the narrative a Reuters News reporter, Kate Kelland, published earlier, suggesting that the journalist may have promoted a biased view supporting Monsanto's talking points.

Reviewing new material in the matter, plaintiff's attorneys say that court documents do not support an earlier claim by Reuters reporter Kate Kelland that evidence in her reporting was based on court documents. Rather, the lawyers say, Kelland relied upon internal documents promoting Monsanto's point of view - documents that are not in the public record.

For more on this story, see U.S. Right To Know's coverage here.

EU SOURCES SAY REGULATORS COPIED AND PASTED MONSANTO DOCUMENTS INTO GERMAN REGULATORY REPORTS

Did European regulators perform their analysis of glyphosate based formulations in a pro-active manner? Or did they regurgitate Monsanto's point of view?

See the story in The Guardian for more coverage.

PROFESSOR CHARLES BENBROOK SAYS MONSANTO STACKED THE DECK, CONVINCING EPA REGULATORS TO SKEW THE DATA IN HERBICIDE MAKER'S FAVOR

Have you wondered why IARC and the EPA could come to such different conclusions about the health risks of glyphosate? A new analysis of the data sources presented says the devil's in the data presented - and omitted.

Fellow scientists point out that IARC is an independent body of scientists with no regulatory power while both EFSA and the EPA are regulators, subject to political pressure.


According to the Guardian, U.S. pesticide expert Charles Benbrook found that:

"EPA regulators used unpublished industry reports in 63% of the studies they evaluated, whereas the IARC relied solely on publicly available literature. 

"Almost three-quarters of the peer-reviewed papers looked at by IARC found evidence of genotoxicity in glyphosate, compared with just 1% of the industry analyses, according to the study published in Environmental Sciences Europe."

See Benbrook's full analysis here.

FRENCH COURT'S DEFINITIVE RULING SAYS GLYPHOSATE MUST GO

Claiming that French environmental officials failed to enforce health and safety protections against glyphosate adequately, a French court in Lyon banned the agricultural chemical.

For more on this story, read France 2's coverage here.

NEW FRENCH DOCUMENTARY ON THE GREAT GLYPHOSATE DEBATE AIRS TOMORROW

France 2 will be airing a major television report on glyphosate Thursday, Jan. 17. For more on that story, click here.