You may have seen Bayer’s recent disturbing attempt to manipulate public opinion: an ad campaign framing glyphosate as a vital “tool” for farmers. They go on to use fear tactics, claiming our food costs will skyrocket if we don’t have policies like a pesticide immunity shield that would protect them from lawsuits. This blatant corporate propaganda ignores the devastating truth: glyphosate is harming our food system, our health, and our economy. In fact, its use is directly contributing to higher food prices in several ways. 

Once a word that most reporters could not pronounce, “glyphosate” is now a common household word, with new studies popping up monthly on the harms of this ingredient that is the most widely used herbicide in the world.

A new report by Friends of the Earth shares that U.S. food retail sector faces $219 billion risk from pesticides. Three new studies show why this is happening.

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Please sign and share this important petition to the EPA by September 14:

Moms Across America reveals alarming levels of glyphosate and pesticides found in top 20 fast food brand meals

ASHEVILLE, NC, Oct 11, 2023 - Moms Across America, a national nonprofit, today announced the results of testing for Glyphosate and pesticides in America’s fast food.

The educational nonprofit has initiated an extensive testing program on the country’s top twenty, highest grossing fast food brands, as listed by the QSR50, in addition to California’s In-N-Out Burger, which is ranked #33. Forty-two samples of 21 brands were tested for the most widely used herbicide in the world, glyphosate, 236 agrochemicals, 4 heavy metals, PFAS, phthalates, and mineral content. The top ten brands were additionally tested for 104 commonly used veterinary drugs and hormones, B Vitamins, and calories.

On Monday, October 9, Moms Across America reported alarming levels of veterinary drugs and hormones found in meals served at the top 10 most frequented fast food restaurants. Today’s report reveals results for the glyphosate and pesticide portion of the testing program.

Glyphosate results summary:

• 100% of the top 20 ( +1) fast food brands contained alarming glyphosate residues.
• Studies show that .1 ppb of glyphosate causes animal liver and organ damage.
• The highest levels detected- 213.58 ppb and 225.53 ppb, totaling 439.11 in two samples- were in Panera Bread, a self-proclaimed proprietor of "good food" and "clean, wholesome foods."
• The second highest levels of glyphosate were found in Arby's sandwiches- 124.2 and 99 ppb, totaling 223.33 ppb. Dairy Queen and Little Caesar’s were nearly tied for third highest, at 126 ppb and 128 ppb total glyphosate detected, respectively.
• The lowest levels were found in Chipotle meals, totaling 4.65 ppb for both samples, which is 94.4 times lower than the highest levels, 439.11 ppb, detected in Panera Bread. Chipotle was one of the first fast food restaurants to advertise non-GMO and organic ingredients.
• Next lowest were Panda Express and McDonald's at 4.75 and 5.58 ppb, respectively.The total amount of glyphosate detected in 42 samples was 2089 ppb, a level over 20,000 times higher than the amount (.1 ppb) that has been found to cause severe organ damage, specifically liver disease, in animal studies (https://doi.org/10.1186/s12302-014-0014-5.).

The full lab report on glyphosate and AMPA can be found here.

Pesticide results summary:

• 76% of fast food brands contained at least trace levels of 27 different kinds of harmful pesticides.
• The highest levels were found in Domino’s and Pizza Hut pizza.
• The “healthier” fast food companies, Panera Bread, In-N-Out and Chipotle, all had either trace or detectable and concerning levels of pesticides.
• The side effects from these pesticides in animal studies include symptoms such as loss of balance, irritable behavior, gut dysbiosis, metabolic disorders, coma, and death.

The full lab report of pesticide results can be found here.

“Moms Across America is concerned about the risk of consuming fast food, as the levels of glyphosate and pesticides found in these popular fast food brands may be a significant contributing factor to the rise of liver disease and organ damage in America,” said Zen Honeycutt, Founder and Executive director of Moms Across America. “Even more concerning are the potential effects of children eating school lunches provided by fast food brands on a daily basis.”

Commissioned by Moms Across America and its supporters, Children’s Health Defense and the Centner Academy, the Fast Food Testing Program tested two types of samples- three to four meals of each type- from each of 21 locations across the United States. Samples were shipped to the Health Research Institute in their original packaging, untouched and frozen.

Moms Across America is a 501c3 nonprofit organization.
For press inquiries, contact Mara Quigley, Steve Allen Media at [email protected] or 661.255.8283

Reposted from Sustainable Pulse

A new peer-reviewed study released by a group of scientists in Taiwan has revealed an astonishingly strong link between severe depression, cognitive decline and exposure to the world’s most used herbicide, glyphosate.

Reposted from: The Detox Project

The Center for Biological Diversity and Greenpeace México have strongly condemned the United States’ heavy-handed intervention into Mexico’s decision to phase out genetically engineered (GE) corn that’s produced using pesticide-intensive farming practices and the herbicide glyphosate. The new U.S. agriculture trade chief Doug McKalip demanded Mexico provide answers to questions about the planned phaseout by Feb. 14 as part of the United States’ threats to respond to Mexico’s decision with punitive steps, including filing formal trade complaints.

Moms Across America Premieres

People Protecting Food Safety

A Japanese Film with a Huge Impact on the American Food Supply

The Japanese government owns the largest grain distribution center in the world. It is based in Convent, Louisiana, USA. 

The distribution center Zen Noh Agriculture purchases hundreds of millions of pounds, over four billion US dollars worth of GMO and non-GMO grains annually, from American farmers and ships them to China, Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and South East Asia.

In other words, the Japanese government owns an outsized stake in the American midwest agriculture system. This is why American Presidents and corporations put enormous pressure on the Japanese government to accept our GMO grains sprayed with glyphosate. The Japanese government, in response to the US and Monsanto’s demands, drastically deregulated glyphosate. Japan’s allowable levels of glyphosate residues are as much as 95% higher than China’s. As a result, Monsanto’s and US grain products have had not only devastating health effects on the people living in Japan but on America as well.

No other market, not even the American mothers, is as intricately connected to the American agriculture system as the Japanese.

The fact is that if the US government was responsible for safe food production, they would not produce toxic GMO crops and export them to any country. And if the Japanese government was responsible for the safety of their people, they would not allow them into their country. The political pressure from the USA is enormous, though. Will the people triumph in protecting their food supply?

As first seen on Sustainable Pulse:

Indiana University School of Medicine researchers are learning more about the effects of herbicide exposure during pregnancy, finding glyphosate in 99 percent of the pregnant women they observed in the Midwest. In the study, published recently in Environmental Health, higher glyphosate levels were associated with lower birth weight and may also lead to higher neonatal intensive care unit admission risk.

This is the second small-scale study the researchers have conducted with significant findings. The team’s previous study, published in 2018, was the first study to confirm glyphosate in 93 percent of pregnancies which found associations with shortened pregnancies. Other recent studies have also confirmed their findings.

“Pesticide exposure in pregnancy, especially in early pregnancy, can imprint DNA and alter gene expression,” said Paul Winchester, MD, professor of clinical pediatrics and the study’s lead author. “But little is known about how these chemicals can impact fetal development in humans.”

“As a neonatologist, I’m seeing more and more infants with problems like low birth weight as well as mothers with issues like obesity or gestational diabetes,” Winchester said. “We need to keep studying these herbicides long term to find out how they could be causing these issues and what we can do to prevent them.”

Researchers hope to study glyphosate exposure in a larger group of pregnant women over time.

This study was a collaborative effort with Franciscan Health in Indianapolis, University of California San Francisco, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and King’s College London School of Medicine.

Read the full article here.