There is also some decent evidence supporting the main ingredient in the herbicide, glyphosate, as an underlying cause of chronic kidney disease in farm workers in countries including Nicaragua, El Salvador, Sri Lanka, and at least one state in India. (the article is from a US publication by the way with links to other articles) The patients are agricultural workers in their twenties and thirties with none of the usual underlying causes such as diabetis mylitis.
Researchers are looking glyphosate as having a synergistic effect with heavy metals, polluted water, other chemicals. In other words the chemical may not be the only cause but it looks like it's on the list. Most of the countries involved have a history of lack of access to clean water. Low level agricultural workers often are working in countries that are hot and even if the water is clean they can't always get water when they need it.
Now we get to GMO's. The deliberate creation of plants that can be poisoned and survive while all the plants around them curl up and die. Problem is that in countries like India the plants in the farm plots are not the only plants the peasants use for food. There may be a hundred different plants on the roadside that the people use for food for themselves or their animals. Adding in the costs of extra water and fertilizer actually makes the engineerd crops no better than the non engineered crops.
Also engineering crops like wheat into putting all its energy into grain at the expense of stalk ignores facts of life in the third world. Farmers eat or sell the grain. Their animals often depend on the straw or waste grain for food. They usually can't afford to buy extra feed. Another example of how ignorance of the third world by the first world can be lethal. And it isn't just the farmers, glyphosate doesn't break down as fast as the scientists hoped. We all are exposed to trace amounts of all those lovely chemicals.
As RoundUp resistant "super weeds" have cause increasing problems Dow chemical has pushed for the EPA to ok increased use of 2 4 D as the answer. Trouble is plants are becoming more resistant to that chemical too. And 2 4 D has a history. It was one of the ingrediants of Viet Nam era Agent Orange.
Of creating plants can created their own pesticide. Often killing good bugs along with the target bugs. Just ask the Monarch butterflies how they are faring these days.
Now we come to a pet theory of mine. It's been cooking for awhile. I've looked at several of the websites pushing so called Intelligent Design. Can't really find out who is footing the bills for the and lawsuits. Yes, ID is often seen as having religious foundations. But I see something else. I have an unused Anthropology degree. I've had classes in genetics and heredity.
Anyone who has studied standard evolution realizes that RoundUp and 2 4 D and plants engineeers to make their own pesticides are doomed to failure. Not all the so called weeds or the insects eating your crops are killed by the engineered products. A few survive and they reproduce. Next time a few more survive and reproduce. Until RoundUp or 2 4 D or the cotton that makes it's own bug killer don't work anymore. We can't kill our way to success. The companies that traffic in death are just hoping they can delay the inevitible just a little longer so they can make just a little more profit. Too bad the true costs in fertilizeer run off, poisoned land, and failed farms never show up on the balance sheets.
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