How much harm will we let the chemical cartel instill upon us?

Recently, male fish in New Jersey have been discovered with female sexual characteristics. Sound like atrazine, Syngenta’s favorite herbicide is at work. According to the NRDC,”Approximately 75 percent of stream water and about 40 percent of all groundwater samples from agricultural areas tested in an extensive U.S. Geological Survey study contained atrazine. NRDC found that the U.S. EPA’s inadequate monitoring systems and weak regulations have compounded the problem, allowing levels of atrazine in watersheds and drinking water to peak at extremely high concentrations.”

Hale to Tyrone Hayes, who discovered and revealed Syngenta’s problem: Atrazine turns male frogs into females.  What happens in the environment is sure to happen to us. If studies allowed experimentation on humans as well as animals, in all likelihood the same outcome would occur. Can we not better manage crops and lessen the use of these toxic substances?

It’s banned in the EU, why not here?  According to the New York Times, “Syngenta, a Swiss chemicals company, produces one of America’s most popular herbicides. It is called atrazine, and 73.7 million pounds of the chemical compound were applied in the United States in 2013. It was used on more than half of all corn crops, two-thirds of sorghum and up to 90 percent of sugar cane. But Syngenta cannot sell atrazine to farms in its own backyard.  The weed killer is banned as a pesticide in the European Union as well as in Switzerland over concerns that it is a groundwater contaminant.” Read the full article here.

Join forces with Save the Frogs to help get this toxic substance banned in the U.S. 

LINKS:

JERSEY FISH

ATRAZINE CONTAMINATING DRINKING WATER 

Atrazine Documentary Coming Soon, Tyrone Hayes

The New Yorker, A Valuable Reputation: the story of Tyrone Hayes and Syngenta