Health Farm

It’s time to skip the so-called most important meal of the day – because breakfast could be killing you.

Weed-killing chemical glyphosate – the active ingredient in Monsanto’s brand, Roundup – has been found in popular breakfast cereals, oats, and snack bars.

Public health watchdog Environmental Working Group (EWG) has detected the presence of glyphosate in all but two of 45 oat-based products it tested.

Some of the highest levels of glyphosate were found in products made by popular household brands, including Quaker, Kellogg’s, and General Mills, who makes Cheerios.

Who to believe

The World Health Organisation calls glyphosate a “probable carcinogen”. The State of California holds a similar view, stating glyphosate is “known to the state to cause cancer”. Yet Monsanto says glyphosate has been stringently tested and used safely for decades.

However, that didn’t stop a San Francisco court demanding Monsanto pay $289m in damages to Dewayne Johnson, a 46-year-old former groundskeeper. The jury found that Monsanto’s Roundup caused Johnson’s cancer, and that it had failed to warn him about the risks to his health.

But Kellogg’s, Quaker, and co continue to deny the carcinogenic potential of their products, simply because detectable levels of glyphosate are below limits set by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). EWG disagrees, saying EPA limits are outdated and products should meet more conservative limits.

However you look at it, Dr Alexis Temkin, a toxicologist at the EWG who worked on the report, is right: “Breakfast cereals are not a place for pesticides linked to cancer”.

What to do

Skip breakfast? Failing that, eat organic oat-based cereals, because wheat used in organic products cannot be sprayed with glyphosate, according to USDA organic standards.

If only. Eating organic is no guarantee of spray-free eating, with tainted ground water, soil, and wind-drift contaminating everything in close proximity, including organic crops.

Yep, turns out the world is awash with glyphosate. Since 1974, when Roundup was first commercially sold, more than 1.6 billion kilograms (or 3.5 billion pounds) of glyphosate has been used in the U.S., alone, making up 19 percent of the 8.6 billion kilograms (or 18.9 billion pounds) of glyphosate used around the world, according to a report published in the peer-reviewed journal, Environmental Sciences Europe.

Sheesh – avocado on toast?

“Breakfast cereals are not a place for pesticides linked to cancer.”