Reprinted from www.organicconsumers.org
"I have cancer, and I don't want these serious issues in HED [EPA's Health Effects Division] to go unaddressed before I go to my grave. I have done my duty."
It's been four years since Marion Copley, a 30-year EPA toxicologist, wrote those words to her then-colleague, Jess Rowland, accusing him of conniving with Monsanto to bury the agency's own hard scientific evidence that it is "essentially certain" that glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup weedkiller, causes cancer.
Copley has since died. But her letter suggesting that EPA officials colluded with Monsanto to hide the truth about Monsanto's flagship weedkiller has been given new life.
Thanks to the persistence of hundreds of plaintiffs in lawsuits alleging that they (or their deceased family members) were diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma after being exposed to Roundup, newly discovered internal emails and other documents are being made public. And they paint an increasingly troubling and sinister picture of corruption.
The Organic Consumers Association is calling on Congress to immediately and fully investigate these and any other revelations that may come to light.
A long history of deceit
For decades, Monsanto has enjoyed a revolving-door relationship with government agencies like the EPA and USDA, giving the chemical company unprecedented power to influence and manipulate the regulatory process.
Meanwhile, the biotech behemoth has attacked scientists' claims that its flagship product, Roundup, causes harm to both humans and the environment, by discrediting scientists who raise concerns, coercing others into producing industry-friendly research, and manipulating corporate media into spinning a favorable narrative.
And while on the one hand clinging steadfastly to its claim that Roundup is "safe," Monsanto strong-armed the junk food industry into joining forces against consumers who said fine, if your Roundup-sprayed GMO foods are safe, you should have no problem labeling them.
But just as the truth about DDT and Agent Orange came too late for many of its victims, so it appears to be the case for hundreds, or more likely tens of thousands of people--all over the world--who have been affected by Monsanto's Roundup.
Here in the U.S., victims are fighting back through a wave of new lawsuits--more than 700, filed in St. Louis, Mo. (Monsanto headquarters) and Alameda, Calif.
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