Gliphosate: Does it cause cancer? Everything you need to know

Glyphosate is a substance that many people associate with a negative effect on health as well as carcinogenicity. It occurs in agriculture as an active ingredient of herbicides intended to fight weeds harmful to crops. For many years, its use aroused controversy and many doubts. Glyphosate itself has been and still is a subject of intense debate.

Glyphosate — what is it?

Glyphosate is an organic compound that belongs to the group of phosphates. It is a component of some herbicides — pesticides used to control weeds growth in crops. It works by inhibiting the enzymes responsible for the biosynthesis of aromatic amino acids. As a result, plants treated with this substance die.

Glyphosate and genetically modified foods

The importance of this substance has increased significantly after development of genetically modified crops. Their DNA contains the gene encoding EPSPS synthase, which is resistant to glyphosate. The development of GMO plants was one of the major technological breakthroughs in agriculture. Thanks to the high resistance to herbicides, it was possible to destroy weeds without the risk of damaging the crops, and thus to optimize the harvest.

Glyphosate — Roundup history

Glyphosate was first obtained in 1950. However, it was not until 1964 that it was patented as a chelate by Stauffer Chemical company. In 1970, glyphosate was also obtained independently by Monsanto. Following the discovery of herbicidal properties, in 1974 they introduced and distributed glyphosate as an ingredient in Roundup, a product that is used in agriculture and industry to this day. Monsanto was acquired by Bayer in 2018. Today, glyphosate is one of the most widely used herbicides worldwide.

Glyphosate — is it carcinogen or not?

The owner of Monsanto (Bayer) maintains that glyphosate herbicides and glyphosate are safe when used as directed and do not cause cancer. In turn, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) points out that "there is no evidence that glyphosate causes cancer in humans.” The same is stated by the European Food Safety Authority. On the other hand, in 2015 the International Agency for Research on Cancer of the World Health Organization (WHO) placed glyphosate on the list of substances with a carcinogenic effect. This substance was classified as 2A agent. This group includes substances “likely to be carcinogenic to humans”. The classification of an agent in this category is recommended if there is no formal evidence of carcinogenicity in humans, but corroborating indicators of its carcinogenicity for humans and sufficient evidence of carcinogenicity in experimental animals.

Since glyphosate was added to the WHO list, much research has been done on this topic. However, the carcinogenicity of glyphosate has not been clearly resolved so far.