Bayer Said to Be Reneging on Roundup Settlement Deals as Virus Closes Courthouses
By Carey Gillam
Bayer AG is reneging on negotiated settlements with several U.S. law firms representing thousands of plaintiffs who claim exposure to Monsanto's Roundup herbicides caused them to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma, sources involved in the litigation said on Friday.
EcoWatch Daily Newsletter
By Carey Gillam
A California shareholder of Bayer AG on Friday filed a lawsuit against the companies' top executives claiming they breached their duty of "prudence" and "loyalty" to the company and investors by buying Monsanto Co. in 2018, an acquisition the suit claims has "inflicted billions of dollars of damages" on the company.
- Cancer Takes Toll as New Roundup Trials Near - EcoWatch ›
- Bayer Apologizes Over Secret List of Monsanto Critics - EcoWatch ›
- Bayer and BASF Ordered to Pay $265 Million to U.S. Peach Farmer ... ›
Home Chef meal delivery service aims to make your life easier with a focus on simple yet healthy and delicious meals. Similar to brands like Blue Apron and HelloFresh, you get all of the ingredients you need – pre-portioned – right to your doorstep. Home Chef also uses packaging designed to be recycled or reused, and their meal kits can reduce the food waste associated with clean up from takeout. All you have to do is follow the step-by-step recipe cards, and voila! A home-cooked meal, ready to eat.
Monsanto Roundup Cancer Trial Postponed in St. Louis, Bayer Stock Climbs
By Carey Gillam
A highly anticipated Roundup cancer trial set to start later this month in the St. Louis area has been pulled from the docket, a court official said on Wednesday.
- Monsanto Cancer Ruling Sparks Backlash Around the Globe ... ›
- Glyphosate Spin Check: Tracking Claims About the Most Widely ... ›
- More Monsanto Roundup Cancer Trials Expected to Be Postponed ... ›
- Former Monsanto CEO Ordered to Testify at Roundup Cancer Trial ... ›
Trending
Update, Jan. 8: On Wednesday, St. Louis County Court spokeswoman Christine Bertelson confirmed that one trial set to start Jan. 27 has been officially postponed with no new trial date yet set. That trial was to pit a woman named Sharlean Gordon against Monsanto.
By Carey Gillam
Discussions are underway to postpone one or more highly anticipated Roundup cancer trials set to start in January, including trials scheduled for St. Louis, the former hometown of Roundup herbicide maker Monsanto Co., according to sources close to the litigation.
- Former Monsanto CEO Ordered to Testify at Roundup Cancer Trial ... ›
- Cancer Takes Toll as New Roundup Trials Near - EcoWatch ›
- Judge Blocks California From Putting Cancer Warning on Roundup - EcoWatch ›
- Bayer Settles Roundup Cancer Suits for Over $10 Billion - EcoWatch ›
By Stacy Malkan
If you like to give friends and family the gift of knowledge about our food, we're here with recommendations for 2019 books and movies that illuminate the issues close to our hearts. At U.S. Right to Know, we believe that transparency – in the marketplace and in politics – is crucial to building a healthier food system for our children, our families and our world. Kudos to the journalists and filmmakers who are exposing how powerful food and chemical industry interests impact our health and the environment.
- This Holiday Season Your Best Gift Can Be a Donation to a Nonprofit ›
- Holiday Shopping: Best Retailers for Toxic-Free Gifts - EcoWatch ›
By Carey Gillam
Former Monsanto Chairman and CEO Hugh Grant will have to testify in person at a St. Louis-area trial set for January in litigation brought by a cancer-stricken woman who claims her disease was caused by exposure to the company's Roundup herbicide and that Monsanto covered up the risks instead of warning consumers.
- Cancer Takes Toll as New Roundup Trials Near - EcoWatch ›
- Bayer Settles Roundup Cancer Suits for Over $10 Billion - EcoWatch ›
By Carey Gillam
For the last five years, Chris Stevick has helped his wife Elaine in her battle against a vicious type of cancer that the couple believes was caused by Elaine's repeated use of Monsanto's Roundup herbicide around a California property the couple owned. Now the roles are reversed as Elaine must help Chris face his own cancer.
Trending
New FDA Report on Pesticides in Fruits and Vegetables Adds to Growing Public Health Concerns
By Carey Gillam
Last month the Food & Drug Administration published its latest annual analysis of the levels of pesticide residues that contaminate the fruits and veggies and other foods we Americans routinely put on our dinner plates. The fresh data adds to growing consumer concern and scientific debate over how pesticide residues in food may contribute – or not – to illness, disease and reproductive problems.
- Strawberries, Spinach Top 'Dirty Dozen' List of Pesticide ... ›
- US Food Sampling Shows Troubling Pesticide Residues ›
- Massive Study Finds Eating Organic Slashes Cancer Risks ... ›
By Stacy Malkan
The International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) is a corporate-funded nonprofit group with chapters around the world that claim to conduct "science for the public good," but documents released in a new study reveal that the influential ILSI science group is a actually a lobby group that protects the interests of the food industry, not public health.
2015 email from Alex Malaspina, founder of ILSI.
ILSI Undermined Obesity Fight in China
<p>In January 2019, two papers by <a href="https://susan-greenhalgh.com/coca-cola-goes-to-china/" target="_blank">Harvard Prof. Susan Greenhalgh</a> revealed ILSI's powerful influence on the Chinese government on issues related to obesity. Prof. Geenhalgh's articles in the <a href="https://www.bmj.com/content/364/bmj.k5050" target="_blank">Journal of Public Health Policy</a> and <a href="https://www.bmj.com/content/364/bmj.k5050" target="_blank">the BMJ</a> document how Coca-Cola and other corporations worked through the China branch of ILSI to influence decades of Chinese science and public policy on obesity and diet-related illnesses such as Type 2 diabetes and hypertension. </p>Jan. 9 article in New York Times.
<p>ILSI is so well-placed in China that it operates from inside the government's Centre for Disease Control and Prevention in Beijing. Dr. Greenhalgh's papers document how Coca-Cola and other Western food and beverage giants "helped shape decades of Chinese science and public policy on obesity and diet-related diseases" by operating through ILSI to cultivate key Chinese officials "in an effort to stave off the growing movement for food regulation and soda taxes that has been sweeping the west," <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/09/health/obesity-china-coke.html" target="_blank">reported Andrew Jacobs in the New York Times</a>.</p><p>Recent studies on ILSI's influence and approach can also be found in <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09581596.2017.1371844" target="_blank">Critical Public Health</a> and the <a href="https://www.milbank.org/quarterly/articles/public-meets-private-conversations-between-coca-cola-" target="_blank">Milbank Quarterly</a>.</p>ILSI Sugar Study “Right Out of the Tobacco Industry’s Playbook”
<p>In 2016, public health experts denounced an ILSI-funded <a href="https://annals.org/aim/fullarticle/2593601/scientific-basis-guideline-recommendations-sugar-intake-systematic-review" target="_blank">sugar study</a> published in a prominent medical journal that presented a "scathing attack on global health advice to eat less sugar," <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/19/well/eat/a-food-industry-study-tries-to-discredit-advice-about-sugar.html" target="_blank">reported Anahad O'Connor in The New York Times</a>. The ILSI-funded study argued that warnings to cut sugar are based on weak evidence and cannot be trusted.</p><p>The Times story quoted Marion Nestle, a professor at New York University who studies conflicts of interest in nutrition research, on the ILSI study: "This comes right out of the tobacco industry's playbook: cast doubt on the science," Nestle said. "This is a classic example of how industry funding biases opinion. It's shameful." </p><p>ILSI has also been accused of working directly on the tobacco industry playbook to thwart public safety measures to reduce smoking. A <a href="https://www.who.int/tobacco/en/who_inquiry.pdf" target="_blank">July 2000 report by an independent committee of the World Health Organization</a> outlined a number of ways in which the tobacco industry attempted to undermine WHO tobacco control efforts, including using scientific groups to influence WHO's decision-making and to manipulate scientific debate surrounding the health effects of tobacco. ILSI played a key role in these efforts, according to a <a href="https://www.who.int/tobacco/media/en/ILSI.pdf" target="_blank">case study about ILSI from the WHO Tobacco Free Initiative</a>. "Findings indicate that ILSI was used by certain tobacco companies to thwart tobacco control policies. Senior office bearers in ILSI were directly involved in these actions," according to the case study. </p>ILSI Leaders Played Key Role in Defending Glyphosate as Chairs of WHO Panel
<p>In May 2016, ILSI was caught "in a conflict of interest row over glyphosate cancer risk," <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/17/unwho-panel-in-conflict-of-interest-row-over-glyphosates-cancer-risk" target="_blank">reported Arthur Neslen</a> in the Guardian, <a href="http://usrtk.org/pesticides/conflict-of-interest-concerns-cloud-meeting-as-international-experts-review-herbicide-risks/" target="_blank">after revelations</a> that the vice president of ILSI Europe, Prof. Alan Boobis, was also chairman of the UN Joint Meeting on Pesticide Residues <a href="https://www.who.int/foodsafety/jmprsummary2016.pdf" target="_blank">(JMPR) panel</a> that found Monsanto's chemical <a href="https://usrtk.org/pesticides/glyphosate-health-concerns/" target="_blank">glyphosate</a> was unlikely to pose a cancer risk through diet. The co-chair of the JMPR panel, Prof. Angelo Moretto, was a board member of ILSI's Health and Environment Services Institute. Neither of the chairs declared their ILSI leadership roles as conflicts of interest, despite the <a href="https://www.usrtk.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/ILSI2012donors.pdf" target="_blank">significant financial contributions ILSI has received</a> from Monsanto and the pesticide industry trade group. </p>ILSI’s Cozy Ties at U.S. CDC
<p>In June 2016, <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/carey-gillam/beverage-industry-finds-f_b_10715584.html" target="_blank">U.S. Right to Know reported</a> that Dr. Barbara Bowman, director of a U.S. Centers for Disease Control division charged with preventing heart disease and stroke, tried to help ILSI's founder Alex Malaspina influence World Health Organization officials to back off policies to reduce sugar consumption. Bowman suggested people and groups for Malaspina to talk to, and solicited his comments on some CDC summaries of reports, the emails show. (Bowman <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/carey-gillam/cdc-official-exits-agency_b_10760490.html" target="_blank">stepped down</a> after our first article was published reporting on these ties.)</p><p>A January 2019 <a href="https://www.milbank.org/quarterly/articles/public-meets-private-conversations-between-coca-cola-and-the-cdc/" target="_blank">study in the Milbank Quarterly</a> describes key emails of Malaspina cozying up to Dr. Bowman. </p>ILSI Influence in India
<p>ILSI has close ties to some Indian government officials and, as in China, the nonprofit has pushed similar messaging and policy proposals as Coca-Cola — downplaying the role of sugar and diet as a cause of obesity, and promoting increased physical activity as the solution, <a href="http://www.indiaresource.org/news/2019/1011.html" target="_blank">according to the India Resource Center</a>. Members of ILSI India's board of trustees include Coca-Cola India's director of regulatory affairs and representatives from Nestlé and Ajinomoto, a food additive company, along with government officials who serve on scientific panels that are tasked with deciding about food safety issues. </p>Longstanding Concerns About ILSI
<p>ILSI insists it is not an industry lobby group, but concerns and complaints are longstanding about the group's pro-industry stances and conflicts of interest among the organization's leaders.</p><p>In 2010, Nature reported on concerns about conflicts of interest between ILSI and the European Food Safety Authority, and noted that the<a href="https://www.nature.com/news/2010/101005/full/news.2010.513.html" target="_blank"> industry ties may taint the reputation of the European regulatory body</a>. </p><p>A 2019 book by Dr. Tim Noakes and Marika Sboros, <a href="http://www.realfoodontrial.com/" target="_blank">Real Food on Trial</a> (Columbus Publishing), recounts the "unprecedented prosecution" of Dr. Noakes "in a multimillion rand case that stretched over more than four years. All for a single tweet giving his opinion on nutrition." Russ Greene reported on the controversy in a 2017 <a href="https://keepfitnesslegal.crossfit.com/2017/01/05/big-food-vs-tim-noakes-the-final-crusade/" target="_blank">article for Keep Fitness Legal</a>. "The Food Industry is attempting to use Dr. Noakes in order to set an example to anyone who dares challenge its authority in nutrition," Greene wrote.</p>Trending
A Matter of Fact – Professor Refuses to Correct Errors in New Scientific Paper Finding Problems With Glyphosate
By Carey Gillam
Update, June 5: On June 5 a spokesperson or Scientific Reports said, "When any issues are raised with Scientific Reports about papers we have published, we investigate them carefully and we will take action where appropriate." He pointed out that Scientific Reports is an online, open-access journal in the "Nature Research family of journals" but is editorially independent of Nature.
The authors of a newly published paper examining the impacts of exposure to the world's most widely used herbicide declared some shocking news.
Bayer Investigates Its Shady PR Firm After 'Monsanto File' Scandal in France
By Stacy Malkan
In the latest PR scandal to engulf Bayer, journalists at Le Monde reported May 9 that they obtained a "Monsanto File" created by the public relations firm FleishmanHillard listing a "multitude of information" about 200 journalists, politicians, scientists and others deemed likely to influence the debate on glyphosate in France.
Stealth Tactics of Bayer’s PR Firms
<p>In 2013, the agrichemical industry tapped FleishmanHillard and Ketchum, both owned by Omnicom, to head up a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-gmo-labeling/u-s-gmo-food-labeling-drive-has-biotech-industry-biting-back-idUSBRE93O18S20130425">PR offensive to rehabilitate the image</a> of GMOs and pesticides. Monsanto selected <a target="_blank" href="http://www.holmesreport.com/sponsored/article/2013/07/24/monsanto-selects-fleishmanhillard-to-reshape-reputation">FleishmanHillard to "reshape" its reputation</a> "amid fierce opposition to the seed giant's genetically modified products," according to the Holmes Report. FleishmanHillard also became the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.prweek.com/article/1275012/bayer-brings-fleishman-global-issues-account">PR agency of record for Bayer.</a> The Council for Biotechnology Information, a trade group now <a target="_blank" href="https://gmoanswers.com/who-we-are">funded by</a> Bayer (Monsanto), Corteva (DowDuPont), Syngenta and BASF, hired Ketchum to launch a <a href="https://usrtk.org/gmo/gmo-answers-is-a-marketing-and-pr-website-for-gmo-companies/" target="_blank">marketing campaign called GMO Answers</a>.</p><p>Spin tactics employed by these firms included "<a href="https://modernfarmer.com/2014/09/monsanto-courts-mommy-bloggers-social-media-set/" target="_blank">wooing mommy bloggers</a>" and using the voices of supposedly "independent" experts to "<a href="http://www.stltoday.com/business/local/monsanto-other-biotech-companies-launch-website-to-answer-gmo-related/article_3ddb6c9f-7655-58c9-81b5-806e44218ace.html" target="_blank">clear up confusion and mistrust</a>" about GMOs. However, evidence surfaced that the PR firms edited and scripted some of the "independent" experts. For example, documents obtained by U.S. Right to Know show that <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/06/us/food-industry-enlisted-academics-in-gmo-lobbying-war-emails-show.html" target="_blank">Ketchum scripted</a> posts for GMO Answers that were signed by a <a href="https://usrtk.org/our-investigations/kevin-folta/" target="_blank">University of Florida professor</a> who claimed to be independent but worked closely with Monsanto. A senior vice president at <a href="https://usrtk.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Pages-from-Van-Eenennaam_Monsanto-editing-IQ2-debate-.pdf" target="_blank">FleishmanHillard edited the speech</a> of a <a href="https://usrtk.org/gmo/alison-van-eenennaam-key-outside-spokesperson-and-lobbyist-for-the-agrichemical-and-gmo-industries/" target="_blank">UC Davis professor</a> and <a href="https://usrtk.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Van-Eenennaam_Monsanto-coaching-IQ2-.pdf" target="_blank">coached her</a> on how to "win over people in the room" at an <a href="https://www.intelligencesquaredus.org/news/media-and-press/in-the-news/monsanto-win" target="_blank">Intelligence Squared debate</a> to convince the public to accept GMOs. Ketchum also coached the professor and <a href="https://usrtk.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Van-Eenennaam-coaching-Olson-radio-show-.pdf" target="_blank">gave her talking points</a> for a radio interview about a scientific study.</p><p>Academics play a key role in agrichemical industry lobbying and PR campaigns, as the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/06/us/food-industry-enlisted-academics-in-gmo-lobbying-war-emails-show.html" target="_blank">New York Times reported in 2015</a>. "Professors/researchers/scientists have a big white hat in this debate and support in their states, from politicians to producers," Bill Mashek, a vice president at Ketchum, <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2303691-kevin-folta-uoffloridadocs.html#document/p84/a237719" target="_blank">wrote to the University of Florida professor</a>. "Keep it up!" The industry trade group CBI has spent over $11 million on Ketchum's GMO Answers since 2013, according to tax records.The spin has influenced journalists, according to the PR industry. In 2014, GMO Answers was <a target="_blank" href="https://www.ketchum.com/ro/news/marina-maher-ketchum-wins-two-clios-ketchum-sports-entertainment-wins-one-award">shortlisted for a CLIO advertising award</a> for "Crisis Management & Issue Management." <a href="http://usrtk.org/gmo/gmo-industry-doesnt-want-you-to-see-this-video/" target="_blank">In this video</a>, Ketchum bragged about how it nearly doubled positive media attention of GMOs and "balanced 80% of interactions" on Twitter. Although the Ketchum video claimed GMO Answers would "redefine transparency" with information from experts with "nothing filtered or censored, and no voices silenced," a Monsanto PR plan suggests the company counted on GMO Answers to help spin its products in a positive light. The <a href="https://usrtk.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/72-Document-Details-Monsantos-Strategy-Regarding-IARC.pdf" target="_blank">document from 2015</a> listed GMO Answers <a href="https://usrtk.org/gmo/monsanto-relied-on-these-partners-to-attack-top-cancer-scientists/" target="_blank">among the "industry partners"</a> that could help protect Roundup from cancer concerns; in a "resources" section on page 4, the plan listed links to GMO Answers alongside Monsanto documents that could communicate the company message that "Glyphosate is not carcinogenic."</p><p>The <a href="http://usrtk.org/gmo/gmo-industry-doesnt-want-you-to-see-this-video/" target="_blank">Ketchum video</a> was posted to the CLIO website and removed after we called attention to it (<a href="http://usrtk.org/gmo/gmo-industry-doesnt-want-you-to-see-this-video/" target="_blank">but we saved it here</a>). </p>Omnicom’s FleishmanHillard and Ketchum: Histories of Deception
<p>Why any company would put FleishmanHillard or Ketchum in front of efforts to inspire trust is difficult to understand, given their histories of documented deceptions. For example:</p><p>Until 2016, Ketchum was the <a href="https://usrtk.org/russias-pr-firm-runs-the-agrichemical-industrys-big-pr-salvo-on-gmos/" target="_blank">PR firm for Russia and Vladimir Putin</a>. According to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.propublica.org/article/from-russia-with-pr-ketchum-cnbc">documents obtained by ProPublica</a>, Ketchum was caught placing pro-Putin op-eds under the names of "seemingly independent professionals" in various news outlets. In 2015, the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Embattled-Honduran-Govt-Hires-Controversial-US-Based-PR-Firm-20150909-0038.html">embattled Honduran government hired Ketchum</a> to try to rehabilitate its reputation after a multi-million dollar corruption scandal.</p><p><a target="_blank" href="https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2008/04/exclusive-cops-and-former-secret-service-agents-ran-black-ops-green-groups/2/">Documents leaked to Mother Jones</a> indicate that Ketchum worked with a private security firm that "spied on Greenpeace and other environmental organizations from the late 1990s through at least 2000, pilfering documents from trash bins, attempting to plant undercover operatives within groups, casing offices, collecting phone records of activists, and penetrating confidential meetings." FleishmanHillard was also caught using unethical espionage tactics against public health and tobacco control advocates on behalf of the tobacco company R. J. Reynolds, according to a study by Ruth Malone in the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1447494/?report=classic">American Journal of Public Health</a>.<em> </em>The PR firm even secretly audiotaped tobacco control meetings and conferences.</p><p>FleishmanHillard was <a target="_blank" href="http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/action/document/page?tid=whc02f00">the public relations firm for The Tobacco Institute</a>, the cigarette industry's main lobbying organization, for seven years. In a 1996 Washington Post article, Morton Mintz <a target="_blank" href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/magazine/1996/03/24/second-hand-money/be084c1c-d396-4207-b1ad-8467f6eb9fb6/?utm_term=.eb5d5f1e8832">recounted the story</a> of how FleishmanHillard and the Tobacco Institute converted the Healthy Buildings Institute into a front group for the tobacco industry in its effort to spin away public concern about the dangers of second-hand smoke. Ketchum <a href="https://usrtk.org/what-the-agrichemical-and-tobacco-industries-have-in-common-pr-firms-operatives-tactics/" target="_blank">also did work for the tobacco industry</a>.</p><p>Both firms have at times worked on both sides of an issue. FleishmanHillard has been <a target="_blank" href="https://www.bizjournals.com/austin/stories/2002/09/16/daily40.html">hired for anti-smoking campaigns</a>. In 2017, Ketchum launched a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/pr-firm-attacks-organic-food-then-pitches-itself-to-organic-companies_b_9462308">spin-off firm called Cultivate</a> to cash in on the growing organic food market, even though Ketchum's GMO Answers has disparaged organic food, claiming that consumers pay a "hefty premium" for food that is no better than conventionally-grown food.</p>- Third Jury Rules Roundup Caused Cancer, Orders Bayer to Pay $2 ... ›
- Bayer Apologizes Over Secret List of Monsanto Critics - EcoWatch ›
Glyphosate Spin Check: Tracking Claims About the Most Widely Used Herbicide
By Stacy Malkan
Amid global debate over the safety of glyphosate-based herbicides such as Monsanto's Roundup, numerous claims have been made to defend the product's safety. In the wake of two recent landmark jury rulings that found Roundup to be a substantial factor in causing non-Hodgkin lymphoma, we examined some of these claims and fact-checked them for accuracy.