How safe are coral dips and can they cause cancer?

[Hitch08]

Read the WSJ article that was linked to in the first post in this thread. That article links to a prior WSJ article, which notes that the International Agency for Research on Cancer, an agency of the World Health Organization, classified Glyphosate as a probably carcinogenic. the WHO Agency cited studies of occupational exposure to glyphosate in the U.S., Canada and Sweden.

I referenced this in my post above (number 30 in this thread). What about that is unscientific? I don't see that any lawyers were involved in that conclusion.

Is there some indication that the plaintiff in this case drank RoundUp? Or smoked it?

 

[KrisReef]

I'm sorry if I was wrong, and this is probably too difficult to follow.
https://geneticliteracyproject.org/...d-activist-scientist-ban-glyphosate-movement/

I must not continue any further in this discussion because once facts no longer matter there is really no reason.
Kind of off-topic, but I do wonder if that Indo import ban will ever end?

 

[Hitch08]

No, not too difficult to follow. You stated that you've been following this for a while. Your posts in this thread implied that there was nothing scientific to support the jury's conclusion...that "lawyers were making unscientific claims"...and that "the courts won for their profession." See below.

Yup, that was 1994. Companies do lie, but this time the lawyers were making unscientific claims.
I've been watching the other side of the story unfold for awhile and the courts won for their profession on this one.

I read the article linked in the first post, as well as a second article linked therein. I agree. Facts matter. The reality is that there is support for the jury's conclusion. You knew of the support, you just disagree with it. Either way, it does exist.

 

[WVNed]

Nothing causes cancer like Ka-Ching baby.

Milking the Monsanto Honeypot

 

[*AKBOB*]

I know a guy who took a shot of formalin (a known carcinogen)....and survived. Messed up his stomach, but is still alive some 25 years later.

Double dog dare or thirsty?

 

[FishDoc]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/jury-f...iller-caused-mans-cancer-11553030151?mod=e2fb

Round up found to cause cancer, what does this mean for other similar products?

Limited read without subscribing and the most damning statement is that a “jury” found a popular weed killer caused cancer? I know it’s likely just the journalists choice of words but short of any “real” evidence idk. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure/know the lack of any real oversight in what’s sold to the public in this trade allows potentially dangerous products to fall into the hands of trusting consumers but this is why we should always take precautions when using chemicals. That should be the take away regardless the known risk... Be safe my fellow fish fanatics.

 

[WVNed]

Carcinogens used to be detected by careful epidemiological studies by scientists

Now they are found by lawyers in a courtroom.

You could cause cancer if you are rich enough to be sued.

 

[*AKBOB*]

Several of you appear to be old enough to remember when the executives of the top seven tobacco companies testified before Congress. All seven testified that cigarettes are not addictive. They acknowledged that they could manipulate the levels of nicotine in their products, but that they only did it to enhance flavor - not to addict. Because, well, the product is not addictive. They also testified that cigarettes may cause health problems, but that the evidence was "not conclusive."

That was in 1994.

Not long after, they started to defend lawsuits by arguing that everyone knew the product is dangerous and that the plaintiff decided to smoke anyway.

Going to give away my age here, but I smoked 35 yrs, 2 packs a day or more if I went out for drinks. By far my favorite "bad habit." One day decided to quit, and did. No pills, patches, therapy, acupuncture or hypnotism from a witch doctor etc.. I just quit. Got tired of paying exorbitant taxes for a product that cost cents when I started. That was ten years ago and the Wife was shocked and still brings it up on occasion today. It was a choice, not an addiction, not a disease.

The problem is the terms "addiction" and "disease" are used as a tool to sell you a cure (usually pharmaceutical or pseudo therapy) for something that doesn't exist or justification for a behavior you want continue and place the blame elsewhere. You treat addiction as a disease and the cycle continues, making the snake oil salesman rich and the simple minded poorer.

But then again, I grew up when boys were boys and girls were girls and things seemed simpler. Now everyone wants to be something they're not and blame everyone else for it and expect the rest of us to walk around on eggshells.

Point is, I smoked and if I die from cancer because of it oh well, it was my choice and I enjoyed it, not gonna blame you for it

 

[WVNed]

I find the statement "probably a carcinogen" as compelling as "probably a rapist'.

He probably mistreats his dog.

Weak minds are easily swayed.

 

[Lousybreed]

Please do not just "dump it down the drain". Landfills are lined with clay soil so all the garbage can't leech out. Dilute your off label coral dip with lots of water and pour it in your driveway. Sunshine volotizes the agent and makes it almost safe. Pour it down the drain, your kids drink it in a month. Common sense people please.

Do you have proof of this?

 

[Sod Buster]

Same concept of the result of flushing all the antidepressant pills down the toilet instead of throwing them away. It is a little strange that a 5 year old with a developing brain has elevated levels of the stuff in their body, having not ever taking the pill.

 

[EMeyer]

I don't blame the jury so much as I blame the courts and the presiding judges

Sorry if my post implied blame for the jurors. I don't blame the jurors at all. We all have areas that are outside our expertise. Normally we may be hesitant to draw conclusions outside our expertise but on a jury, they are specifically asked to do so.

I blame the lawyers, judges, and media professionals who pretend that trial by jury is a valid way of determining scientific truth.

 

[Sod Buster]

Did some research reading, on the battlecoral thread, UWC EXPEL looks pretty good and safer. Better yet it's clear so you can see what's happening in the bowl. UWC was stated as being a sponsor on this site.

Edit: 75% natural herb blend
25% rodi water

 

[bluprntguy]

There are specific reasons that glyphosate is extremely unlikely to be carcinogenic, a mutagen or a teratogen, but it would take a great deal of biochemistry to explain why.

What you are reading is an epidemiological inevitability - one in about 3 people will eventually die of cancer. If we lived long enough (i.e., our hearts didn't give out), it's almost certain that everyone would die of cancer. Just because you used RoundUp at one time or another and now have cancer does not mean that it's carcinogenic.

Limited read without subscribing and the most damning statement is that a “jury” found a popular weed killer caused cancer? I know it’s likely just the journalists choice of words but short of any “real” evidence idk. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure/know the lack of any real oversight in what’s sold to the public in this trade allows potentially dangerous products to fall into the hands of trusting consumers but this is why we should always take precautions when using chemicals. That should be the take away regardless the known risk... Be safe my fellow fish fanatics.

Two different juries have now spent months listening to testimony and reviewing the scientific facts and they both concluded that glyphosphate (roundup) CAUSED specific cancers in two separate people.

From the case:

• The world health organization has reviewed the research and listed glyphosphate as a probable carcinogen.
• Populations exposed to roundup have a much higher incidence of specific forms of lymphoma.
  
• Documents unsealed in the latest case indicate that the producer of roundup ghostwrote “research” that was later attributed to academics (i.e. they paid people to lie) in an effort to hide the dangers from glyphosphate.
• Employees at the EPA mostly agreed that Roundup is carcinogenic and disagreed with the decision to list it as low risk.

It’s somewhat hard for me to believe that anyone still thinks that roundup is safe much less willing to go online and claim that it’s indisputable that it’s safe.

 

[Dkeller_nc]

That's kind of an aside to the topic of this thread, but as a scientist, I find it highly amusing when an individual/company advertises something as a "natural herb blend" or made with "natural products", with the implied suggestion that "all natural" somehow makes the product less hazardous. Nothing could be further from the truth - many, many "natural herbs" will kill you if ingested, and many of them are extremely harmful if accidentally ingested by other means, such as accidental volatilization. Not a herb, of course, but many reefers are familiar with the dangers of palythoa and the toxin that they produce. It's a deadly neurotoxin, but completely "all natural".

 

[Dkeller_nc]

Two different juries have now spent months listening to testimony and reviewing the scientific facts and they both concluded that glyphosphate (roundup) CAUSED specific cancers in two separate people.

This is actually relatively simple. By definition, a jury of lay people cannot conclude that a product does/does not cause cancer. Period. It takes scientific training to draw those sorts of conclusions; while scientific training is not sufficient to draw a conclusion, it is a requisite precursor.

And there's another aspect of this that's important. The questions that need to be asked are:

1) Is it different?
2) Does it matter?

The first question is the one that requires technical training to answer. The second one is a societal judgment. With respect to glyphospate, one can reasonably ask the question of "Assuming this compound has a (low) but non-zero risk to human health, does it still make sense to use it?". Such a question would require analysis of the harm that non-use would have, and there would definitely be some with respect to crop yields and the expense of food, particularly in developing countries.

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Pretty much everything, in the right concentration and exposure, will cause for cancer proliferation. Mouth wash, nail polish remover, VOC's in paints, milk, etc.

And yes, there currently is a class action on glyphosate (RoundUp)....that has nothing to do with Bayer insecticides.

The subject insecticide used as a coral dip contains variants of Tobacco tea and chrysanthemum extract (pyrethrin derivative)....yes, the flower, mums! I handle with care, not to get it directly on me, especially in concentrated form, but otherwise, I'm more concerned when I handle muriatic acid. FYI, and I'm a chemist.

Agree. The dose makes the poison. Paracelsus coined this saying 500 years ago and still holds true. It all depends how much exposure and how long. Carcinogens are another story. Modern theory of silver bullet says its like the lottery, you need the right agent to hit the right part of the DNA and make the right change that causes cancer. So could be single exposure and boom cancer (extremely unlikely) or you could be exposed all your life and never get cancer. Hard to say, but the best thing to do is just avoid inhalation exposure or ingestion as much as possible.

To the OP, Bayer is a neurotoxin, so its bad in its own right (affects brain function and nerves), but remember, we are using very small amounts. There are people who use this in large quantities and are seemingly okay.

 

[bluprntguy]

This is actually relatively simple. By definition, a jury of lay people cannot conclude that a product does/does not cause cancer. Period. It takes scientific training to draw those sorts of conclusions; while scientific training is not sufficient to draw a conclusion, it is a requisite precursor.

Exactly. Employees at the EPA, who are trained scientists didn’t think roundup is safe and generally agreed that it causes cancer. Employees at the world health organization, who are trained scientists, concluded that roundup is not safe and probably causes cancer. The company that produces roundup paid people to lie about the products safety. Scientists have since published peer reviewed studies showing that populations exposed to roundup for years have an significant increase in non-hodgkins lymphoma. A jury (that likely had scientists on it) looked at all that evidence and simply agreed that the science has proven that roundup is not safe.

I’m not even going to respond to the question about whether it makes sense to poison our food supply with a carcinogenic substance so that giant corporations don’t have to employ people to weed their fields because that’s such a ridiculous position and so far off topic...

 

[Sod Buster]

Some other notable group 2A carcinogens from the cancer society site: wood smoke, tungsten carbide, deep fryer emissions, red meat, very hot beverages such as coffee, talc baby powder, nitrate or nitrite, lead, bug spray, urethane. Also a hair dresser or barber is more likely to develop cancer than other occupations from group 2A.

 

[Hitch08]

This is actually relatively simple. By definition, a jury of lay people cannot conclude that a product does/does not cause cancer. Period. It takes scientific training to draw those sorts of conclusions; while scientific training is not sufficient to draw a conclusion, it is a requisite precursor.
...

True. And they didn't. They determined that the testimony of those who do have the ability to draw such a conclusion was credible. They did so after hearing the testimony of those who (yes, I'm repeating myself) have the ability to express an opinion that the product was not harmful. And they did so after listening to counsel from both sides cross-examine the opposing experts and hearing the experts testify as to why the opposing expert opinions/conclusions were incorrect.