Food System

Microbiome and glyphosate, new studies

April 27, 2019

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Glyphosate (or glyphosate) and the microbiome, what impact and harm? Two recent scientific publications, on bees and humans, offer new insights into the genotoxicity of the planet’s most widely used pesticide.

Microorganisms and life

Genetic transmission in bacteria occurs horizontally and randomly. That is, for about 2.7 billion years, according to a conservative estimate, microbes can unite quickly, even if very different, when single stretches of DNA match between them. (1) Horizontal transmission has gradually evolved into a more precise and selective vertical system in complex organisms such as animals and plants (whose reproduction is thus possible only among similar individuals). ‘Superorganisms’ are themselves complex systems where vertically transmitted elements (endowed with DNA) coexist with billions of horizontally transmitted microorganisms. (2)

The microbiome is the set of microorganisms ‘cultivated’ by every living thing. In the intestines, which can harbor more than 1,300 bacterial species, but also in the skin (1,000 species), the oro-pharyngeal-respiratory system (600), the uro-genital tract (about 60), and the stomach (25). (2) Each of us is a superorganism, that is, a dynamic ecosystem where the activities of human and microbial cells interact both with each other and with those of the external environment. So that it takes up and assimilates substances that can maintain the system, protect it from alteration by the environment, and reproduce similar systems (the offspring).

Humans like other mammals make use of this set of microorganisms that accounts for about 3 percent of their body mass. The human body houses 100 trillion bacterial cells, 1.5 kg on average, to fulfill various functions. This symbiosis also takes place in plants, where about 30 percent of biological activities are entrusted to bacteria and take place in the rhizosphere (the portion of the soil close to the root system). Through the interaction between native microorganisms and those that come from food and the environment.

Microorganisms and agribusiness

Microorganisms considered pathogens, since the late 1950s have been regarded as enemies to be put down. However, the purposes of safeguarding crops gave way to tools that in the medium to long term proved inadequate. For in order to destroy harmful microorganisms, those essential to plant health were also destroyed. (1) With an approach in some respects similar to that used in medicine with the unregulated use of antibiotics (which, in turn, damage the gut microbiota).

Take an automobile as an example . If, in order to solve a seasonal problem (e.g., corrosion of rims from exposure to salt on the roads), one were to remove an essential part of it (in the example, the wheels), the intervention would be incompatible with the primary function of the entity-car. Similarly, if you eliminate microorganisms in a plant or human, the system is deprived of the resources it needs to function properly. There is no proportion between ends and means, yet we consider it ‘normal’ to live ‘without wheels.’

Bacteria, protozoa, algae and fungi are much simpler organisms than animals and plants, and it is often impossible to prevent their presence in the air, water and land. Therefore, it must be understood whether such a presence always and at all costs represents an obstacle to be knocked down or rather a symbiosis to be indulged, providing where appropriate to strengthen the defenses of the complex organism. Today’s soil has on average only 1 percent organic matter, which is 70 percent less than the organic matter available in the middle of the last century. Bacterial strains with millennia of history have disappeared, and the residual microorganisms are essentially the only ones that have survived repeated attacks by the most venomous pesticides (DDT, atrazine, paraquat, glyphosate).

The bee microbiome

The symbiosis of ‘native’ and ‘transient’ microorganisms is indispensable to the biological functions of plant organisms, as well as those of humans and animals. Including apoid (or pollinator) insects, which are responsible for 70 percent of agricultural production. Bees also have a gut and possess a microbiome that is as delicate as it is complex. But how can they continue to work and contribute to the biological cycle of the planet if they are deprived of this essential part? And how can they overcome stress and illness without the ability to fight them?

Scientific communities and trade associations have been debating for years how best to preserve the bee biota. And that is why, for example, garlic-based syrups, with known antibacterial properties, are administered to prevent the onset of seasonal diseases (e.g., nosemia). (3)

The bee differs from other insects and animals in that it is endowed with a unique gene that unites it with plants. (9) This gene, found in plants and some microorganisms, is capable of synthesizing an enzyme (EPSP) that in turn produces three amino acids essential to the symbiosis of microorganisms. It was only through a recent scientific publication that the critical role of the enzyme EPSP for bee life was discovered. (7) In fact, the study showed how EPSP inhibition produces negative effects in the bee’s gut by promoting the proliferation of pathogenic bacteria.

Glyphosate, bees and other living species

Fred Gould-entomologist, pathologist and ecologist, distinguished professor at ‘North Carolina State University’ -has demonstrated the direct causal link between glyphosate and bee disease. The pesticide does not kill the bacteria in the bees’ gut but prevents them from growing and encoding the EPSP enzyme. The extermination of bees caused by neonicotinoid pesticides is thus compounded by the deaths caused by glyphosate, which makes apoid insects vulnerable to the most common diseases.

Monsanto-Bayer actually explains that glyphosate ‘is a molecule in the amino acid family discovered by Monsanto in the early 1970s’ that ‘inhibits a plant-produced enzyme (the EPSPS enzyme) by blocking the production of 3 aromatic amino acids essential for protein synthesis.’ He lies, however, in stating that ‘such enzyme is present only in the plant kingdom, glyphosate acts only on plant organisms.‘ (8)

Glyphosate inhibits a process that is vital not only to plants but also to other living species, such as microorganisms and bees. In fact, the only organisms that can survive this ‘total inhibitor’ are plants that have undergone genetic modification. The infamous ‘Roundup-Ready,’ from the trade name of Monsanto’s trademark glyphosate ‘Roundup. And this is indeed the strategy of the Big 4, as documented in the ebook ‘
GMOs, the Big Scam’.
Binding global agricultural production to dependence on patented pesticides and seeds.

Glyphosate and us

Glyphosate, to eradicate the ‘weed,’ attacks microorganisms. It thus destroys the soil biota, which nourishes plants, and the microbiome of pollinating insects. As for us, it is unlikely, to say the least, that the agrotoxin in question is a ‘panacea’ for human immune defenses, since its molecule does not distinguish between strains and families of bacteria. The mere idea of interrupting an evolutionary process that has lasted millions of years to exterminate the microorganisms on which the life of complex organisms depends should be prosecuted as an international crime against humanity and the environment. But politics and administrations, in this corrupt society, prefer the interests of turbo-capitalism to the public good.

‘
Dating back to 2016
the first analyses aimed at tracing glyphosate in honey, analyses conducted following the discovery of the molecule in many, if not all, of the matrices considered by the various studies conducted around the world. Glyphosate has been traced in food, in baby diapers and female tampons, in human blood and semen, in placenta and breast milk, in water and beer–just to name the most striking examples, those that have most caught the public’s attention; but the list is endless, the molecule is present everywhere, even in honey.‘ (9)

The latest research published in ‘Nature‘ highlights that ‘glyphosate could induce transgenerational inheritance of disease and germline epimutations (e.g., of spermatozoa). We can speculate that the generational toxicology of glyphosate should be considered in the disease etiology of future generations’. (10) In other words, the most widespread agrotoxic on planet earth should be considered among the causes of human disease for generations to come (!).

Guido Cortese and Dario Dongo

Notes

(1) Gustavo Giovannetti (2015). ‘Biodiversity of an agrarian soil’, Fossano.

(2) Jason Lloyd-Price et al, US National Institutes of Health (2017). ‘Strains, functions and dynamics in the expanded Human Microbiome Project‘. Nature 550, 61-66 pp. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature23889

(3) Zooprophylactic Institute of Latium and Tuscany (2011). ‘Prevention and control of nosemiadi’. Apimondi Italy 01/11, %C2%

(4) De-quiang Pu, Min Shi et al. (2014). ‘Flower-visiting insects and their potential impact on transgene flow in rice‘. British Ecological Society. https://doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.12299

(5) Harmen P. Hendriksma, Meike Küting, […], and Christoph C. Tebbe. (2013). ‘Effect of Stacked Insecticidal Cry Proteins from Maize Pollen on Nurse Bees (Apis mellifera carnica) and Their Gut Bacteria‘. PLoS One. 2013; 8(3): e59589. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0059589

(6) ‘Rounding up the Honey Bees. Ecology, Physiology and Genetics (2019), https://schaechter.asmblog.org/schaechter/2018/11/rounding-up-the-honey-bees-2.html

(7) E.V.S. Motta et al. (2018). ‘Glyphosate perturbs the gut microbiota of honey bees’. Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. USA. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1803880115

(8) Glyphosate (https://www.roundup.it/il_glifosate.php)

(9) See ‘The ways of glyphosate are endless‘ (2019). The apis, http://www.lapisonline.it/dossier/dossier-aspromiele/view/productdetails/virtuemart_product_id/71/virtuemart_category_id/2.html

(10) Deepika Kusbad et al. (2019). ‘Assessment of Glyphosate Induced Epigenetic Transgenerational Inheritance of Pathologies and Sperm Epimutations: Generational Toxicology‘, Nature https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-42860-0, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-42860-0

Guido Cortese

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Computer scientist and professional beekeeper. A former conscientious objector, he served and then volunteered in a canteen for the homeless in Turin. He deals with the right to food, food policy, food sovereignty and biodiversity. He founded the association of Metropolitan Pollinators with the aim of defending biodiversity through specific projects of social and environmental regeneration. He represents the Slow Food Community of Metropolitan Pollinators. He promoted the birth of the national network of urban beekeepers. He directs an independent agricultural market, collaborates and writes for Egalitè (Onlus Rome) which deals with defending the rights of disadvantaged people, and with the newspapers Great ItalianFood Trade, Qualiformaggio, L'apicoltore Italiano and minor magazines.