Citation: Novotny, E. Glyphosate, Roundup and the Failures of Regulatory Assessment.
Toxics 2022, 10, 321. Link: https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics10060321  
Academic Editor: Gilles-Eric Seralini

Just published in Toxics (Impact Factor 4.4) by Eva Novotny, University of Cambridge, UK; contact: en.en.eclipse.co.uk
The weed-killer Roundup containing glyphosate (and other compounds) is widely claimed at a regulatory level to be safe for people, animals and the environment, but that assurance results from faulty regulation. Regulators do not distinguish between the declared active ingredient (i.e. glyphosate) and the whole formulation of a pesticide, and they test only the declared active ingredient on the long-term.  Thus, they neglect the far greater toxicity (by a factor in excess of 100) of the additives.  This deliberate neglect results from the close ties between the regulators and the pesticide industry.  When a pesticide is assessed for safety, the studies on which a judgement is based are almost entirely those produced by the corporations developing or selling the pesticide; studies carried out by scientists independent of any interest in the industry are dismissed on bureaucratic grounds.  Proper assessment is further confounded by the covert influence of the pesticide industry, as is exemplified by the infamous ‘Monsanto Papers’ — previously confidential internal e-mails and other documents — which reveal how Monsanto strove to counter and destroy any scientific evidence that found Roundup to be harmful.  It is imperative for the regulatory agencies to be reformed.