WHO: Glyphosate is “probably carcinogenic to humans”

Glyphosate, the world’s most widely-used herbicide, the key ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller, is “probably carcinogenic to humans”

The Wall Street Journal and Financial Times focus on Monsanto’s call for the World Health Organisation’s cancer agency to retract a report published on Friday in the journal Lancet Oncology by researchers for WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer.

The report found that glyphosate, the world’s most widely-used herbicide and the key ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller, is “probably carcinogenic to humans”.

This review of existing studies includes reports on the effects of glyphosate on farming and forestry workers. The people exposed to glyphosate experienced a higher incidence of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma than those who were not exposed, according to the review.

The IARC report points out that 750 products used in agriculture, forestry and domestic gardening contain glyphosate and its use has increased sharply with the development of GM glyphosate-resistant crop varieties.

Monsanto’s current generation of herbicide-resistant genetically modified crops depends on farmers spraying their fields with glyphosate to kill weeds. Glyphosate had been detected in air during spraying, in water and in food.

But the company has consistently argued that its seeds and weedkillers are safe, and has fought efforts to label foods made with genetically-modified crops.

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