Tag Archives: organophosphate

Did Canada include Glyphosate in its study of Environmental Chemicals?

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To a few scientist friends
+++++++++++++++++++
Dear friends,

I trouble you again in search of some truths or information from three reports that Health Canada (ministry of health, Canada) has published of studies on various harmful manmade environmental chemicals and how much of each has been found in humans. The studies started in 2007 for the first report, and ended with the publication of the third report in 2015.

Two of these three reports are available from Health Canada web site, and one is available by personal request made to Health Canada. I have all three of them and have been going over them repeatedly, to find if the Government considers Glyphosate to be a harmful environmental chemical (as a herbicide) and if Canadians have been tested for its presence in their body fluids.

I have found mention of other substances such as 2,4-D, 2,4,5-T, Atrazine, Dicamba, and many many other pesticides and herbicides, as well as metals such as Uranium, Lead and Arsenic. But I failed to find a single mention of Glyphosate or RoundUp.

There are mentions of organophosphates, but I am unsure if it includes Glyphosate and how much of it has been found in humans.

Ultimately, I decided to pass the three reports, the first (2007-2009), the second (2009-2011) and the third (2012-2013, published 2015) to you for some help in finding if Glyphosate is at all represented in Health Canada’s ten year study on environmental chemicals and human exposure to them.

The three reports are:

1. report-rapport-eng.pdf
2. HumanBiomonitoringReport__EN.pdf
3. chms-ecms-cycle3-eng.pdf

I would very much appreciate if any of you can advise me if these three definitive reports by Health Canada on Canadian citizen’s exposure to environmental chemicals does or does not include Glyphosate.

I wished to also pass some of these to Nancy Swanson, but since she changed her email, I am out of touch with her. Perhaps one of you will pass this to her, in case she might offer to help.

The reason I ask this is – I intend to do something about it in case Health Canada has neglected to test Glyphosate in Canadians. I do not know yet what I would do, but that would depend on if and how much these reports have or have not covered Glyphosate.

By the way, the first and the second report covers the generic topic of “pesticide” and the third, the most recent one, does not.

I apologize again for troubling you all.
I do not know where else I could go.

Thanks and best wishes
Tony Mitra

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Edmonton uses toxic chemical banned by other cities

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Meet Sheryl McCumsey of Edmonton, Canada.
She has been battling the municipal Govt of Edmonton for a while on account of using Dursban within city limits. I spoke with her and recorded her conversation for you all to listen to.

What is Dursban ? It is a brand name product by Dow chemical. The active chemical is named Chlorpyrifos. It falls under a group of chemicals called organophosphates.  The chemical interrupts the electrochemical process used by nerves of insects and higher animals to communicate with brains, muscles, organs and with one another.

It was discovered a few centuries ago, but its killing powers got better understood in the 1930s and this chemical was manufactured in Nazi Germany as a nerve gas agent for killing people although chemical weapons had been banned by then.

Today, it is often used in agriculture and as pest control.

EPA ordered a phaseout of this chemical by the turn of the century, year 2000, and removed the product from shelves, mainly due to concern of health risks for humans, particularly children.

The chemical Chlorpyrifos is banned in Singapore from using it for termite control. It is banned in South Africa from residential use. In 2010, India barred Dow from commercial activity in india for five years after its Central Bureau of Investigation (Indian version of FBI) found Dow guilty of bribing an Indian official in 2007 to allow the sale of Chlorpyrifos.

In Canada, it is not used anywhere except in Edmonton. Winnipeg stopped using it but had leftover stock. Edmonton reportedly bought the stuff. Somehow, Govt of Canada re-registered the product and allowed its use, and the municipality of Edmonton is reportedly using it without disclosing to the public where, when and how much of it is used.

I leave it for Sheryl to explain the rest. Its a 25 minute podcast. You can listen by clicking the play button.

From Sheryl McCumsy :
Besides sharing information and researching the harm of chlorpyrifos I suggest people lobby to city and provincial government to discontinue the use of this insecticide as there are safer alternatives. Bee well and Bee informed! Ditch the Dursban and Delight in Dragonflies. contact Sheryl at Pesticide Free Edmonton on facebook or e-mail at: Pesticide Free Alberta