The Fight Against Monsanto's Roundup by Mitchel Cohen

Author:Mitchel Cohen
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781510735149
Publisher: Skyhorse
Published: 2018-01-23T16:00:00+00:00

IARC Pushes Back

In October 2016, in another exclusive scoop,34 Kelland portrayed IARC as a secretive organization that had asked its scientists to withhold documents pertaining to the glyphosate review. The article was based on correspondence provided to Kelland by a pro-industry law group.35

In response, IARC took the unusual step of posting Kelland’s questions and the answers they had sent her,36 which provided context left out of the Reuters story.

IARC explained that Monsanto’s lawyers were asking scientists to turn over draft and deliberative documents, and in light of the ongoing lawsuits against Monsanto, “the scientists felt uncomfortable releasing these materials, and some felt that they were being intimidated.” The agency said they had faced similar pressure in the past to release draft documents to support legal actions involving asbestos and tobacco, and that there was an attempt to draw deliberative IARC documents into PCB litigation.

The story didn’t mention those examples, or the concerns about draft scientific documents ending up in lawsuits, but the piece was heavy on critiques of the IARC, describing it as a group “at odds with scientists around the world,” which “has caused controversy” with cancer assessments that “can cause unnecessary health scares.” The IARC has “secret agendas” and its actions were “ridiculous,” according to a Monsanto executive quoted in the story.

The IARC wrote in response37 (emphasis in original): “The article by Reuters follows a pattern of consistent but misleading reports about the IARC Monographs Programme in some sections of the media beginning after glyphosate was classified as probably carcinogenic to humans.”

The IARC also pushed back on38 Kelland’s reporting about Blair, noting the conflict of interest with her source Tarone and explaining that the IARC’s cancer evaluation program does not consider unpublished data and “does not base its evaluations on opinions presented in media reports,” but on the “systematic assembly and review of all publicly available and pertinent scientific studies, by independent experts, free from vested interests.”

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