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In 2015, a prestigious United Nations–affiliated health agency, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), designated glyphosate as “a probable carcinogen in humans,” and “found a particular association between glyphosate-based pesticides and non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.” When the IARC issued its findings, the group’s credibility posed a significant public relations problem for Monsanto.
Monsanto’s denials that it knew about the potential dangers of glyphosate have been proven false by evidence that has come to light in recent years when public-interest litigators took the company to court and gained access to its internal communications.
Email communications from Monsanto staff revealed how the company launched a massive behind-the-scenes campaign to discredit the IARC and its allegations. Tipped off by the EPA before the IARC published its findings, Monsanto quickly began working on counter-messaging about the product’s classification as a likely carcinogen. The company’s chairman made public statements smearing the scientists as meddlesome activists peddling politically motivated “mischief” and “junk science.” The company planned to spend over $200,000 on a public relations campaign to discredit the IARC, working with agrochemical industry lobby groups to write letters to officials at the World Health Organization and regulatory agencies around the globe.
“Cozy” only begins to describe the relationship between Monsanto and the regulators. The company’s internal communications indicate that a telephone conversation took place between a Monsanto employee and an EPA scientist, Jess Rowland, during which Rowland told Monsanto that he would help to block a planned review of the evidence concerning glyphosate’s safety. Rowland was also asked by Monsanto if he would help the agency “correct the record” about the IARC study and was sent documents to guide the EPA’s responses to media inquiries.
Email communications also reveal how Monsanto’s chief of regulatory science, toxicologist William Heydens, explained to his colleagues how “ghost-writing” research articles for leading scientific journals works: they could pay nominally independent scientists to “have their names on the publication,” but Monsanto would actually be “doing the writing” and the authors “would just edit [and] sign their names, so to speak.” Heydens’ emails suggest that ghost-writing is not an atypical strategy for handling the company’s public relations concerns, and they go on to identify some prominent research papers that were written by Monsanto employees or affiliates. Notably, at least one ghost-written paper has been cited by the EPA as compelling evidence attesting to Roundup’s safety. This was but one of several ways the company corrupted science to defend its profits in disregard of public health.
