The Best Democracy Money Can Buy by Dave Ward

Author:Dave Ward [Ward, Dave]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Published: 2011-09-15T20:24:54+00:00

After scouring the purloined Committee documents, Monsanto faxed a warning to company allies in government that one participant on the Experts Committee, Dr Michael Hansen, “is not completely on board”. Indeed he was not. Hansen was furious. A BST expert with the Consumers’ Policy Institute, Washington, Hansen interprets the memos to mean that some US

and Canadian authorities, supposedly acting as objective, unaffiliated scientists, were in fact working in cahoots with Monsanto as advocates for the producer.

Other memos discuss plans by US and Canadian officials sympathetic to Monsanto, to “share their communication strategy” with industry. The plan was to lobby members of the Experts Committee. Monsanto would secretly provide help in preparing a response to critics of BST

ahead of the vote of the experts panel scheduled for February 1998. Whether the scheme using inside information affected the outcome, we don’t know. We do know Monsanto won that vote.

Because proceedings were confidential, we cannot know how a majority overcame objections of known dissenters. But we can presume Monsanto was not harmed by the late addition of BST

defender Dr Len Ritter to the deliberations. An intraoffice memo obtained from Canada’s Bureau of Veterinary Drugs states that Dr Ritter’s name was subtly suggested to the bureau’s director in an August 1997 phone call from Dr David Kowalczyk, Monsanto’s regulatory affairs honcho. Of course, there is not much value to Monsanto in obtaining government approvals to sell BST-laden milk if no one will buy the stuff. Luckily for Monsanto, the US FDA not only refuses to require labelling hormone-laced products, but in 1994 published a rule which effectively barred dairies from printing “BST-free” on milk products. This strange milk carton exception to America’s Bill of Rights was signed by Michael Taylor, deputy to the FDA Commissioner. Prior to joining the US agency, Taylor practiced law with the firm of King & Spalding, where he represented Monsanto. Taylor, no longer in government, did not return our calls to his office at his current employer—Monsanto Washington.

Monsanto does not just place friends in government, it likes to make friends. Canadian Health Ministry researcher Dr Margaret Haydon told me Monsanto offered her bureau $1-2 million in a 1994 meeting in return for their authorizing the sale of BST. Monsanto counters the funds were proffered solely to support the cash-strapped agency’s research. When asked if he considered the Monsanto offer “a bribe”, Haydon’s supervisor replied, “Certainly!” though he said he laughed off the proposal.

No one’s laughing now. Haydon and five other government scientists filed an extraordinary plea with Canada’s industrial tribunal seeking protection for their jobs and careers. They fear retaliation for ripping the cover off longhidden, highly damaging facts about BST. America’s rush to approve the hormone in 1993 rested on a study published in the journal Science by FDA researchers, which concluded there were no “significant changes” in BST-fed rats. The rats tell a different tale. Their autopsies revealed thyroid cysts, prostate problems and signs of BST

invading their blood. The Monsantosponsored US researchers failed to publish these facts and the FDA sealed the full study, saying its public release would “irreparably harm” Monsanto.

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