REGION OF WATERLOO YOU ARE ON THIN ICE

Yesterday's Waterloo Region Record carried the following article titled "Monsanto to pay man $289M US in Roundup weed killer lawsuit". Science as always takes considerable time to study and make determinations especially in the matter of toxic substances. Cancer takes years to develop and sometimes is due to years of exposure to toxins and other times not. Industry, especially the pesticide and chemical industry, rely on this. They literally make billions of dollars on products first and only after either the environmental damage is obvious (DDT) or after the health damage is obvious (2,4,5-T agent orange) do they stop production.

Glyphosate (Roundup) has been problematic for a very long time. The chemical industry of course say that it is safe. They have both their own tame scientists as well as the current U.S. President putting his man at the top of the EPA to reduce government oversight over business and industry. Our own Doug Ford, here in Ontario, is simply a Donald Trump "light" version.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) as well as the World Health Organization (WHO) believe that glyphosate is a probable carcinogen. The state of California have also added glyphosate to its list of chemicals known to cause cancer.

How is this relevant to the Region of Waterloo? WE have glyphosate in our tap water thank you very much to both local agriculture and local residential use as well as probably to local pesticide manufacturing. Simply check the Region of Waterloo's website under Quality & Treatment of our drinking water. Their Annual Reports have indicated Glyphosate for many years at <25 ppb which means less than 25 parts per billion. The problem is this. Other industrial chemicals are either very low as in one to three parts per billion or they are listed as <.5 ppb. That's right if all the other toxic chemicals are listed as non-detect at a method detection limit (MDL) of 1/2 a part per billion then why is glyphosate at <25 ppb. The answer is simple. Glyphosate is likely to be present at 5 or ten ppb in our drinking water and by using a very high MDL we don't get to see the actual concentration. If it rises to 25 to 30 ppb will the Region then represent it as <50 ppb?