Revealed: The secret push to bury a weedkiller’s link to Parkinson’s disease
Internal documents from chemical giant Syngenta reveal tactics to sponsor sympathetic scientific papers and mislead regulators about unfavorable research
by Carey Gillam
Fri 2 Jun 2023 12.00 BST
The global chemical giant Syngenta has sought to secretly influence scientific research regarding links between its top-selling weedkiller and Parkinson’s, internal corporate documents show.
While numerous independent researchers have determined that the weedkiller, paraquat, can cause neurological changes that are hallmarks of Parkinson’s, Syngenta has always maintained that the evidence linking paraquat to Parkinson’s disease is “fragmentary” and “inconclusive”.
But the scientific record they point to as proof of paraquat’s safety is the same one that Syngenta officials, scientists and lawyers in the US and the UK have worked over decades to create and at times, covertly manipulate, according to the trove of internal Syngenta files reviewed by the Guardian and the New Lede.
The files reveal an array of tactics, including enlisting a prominent UK scientist and other outside researchers who authored scientific literature that did not disclose any involvement with Syngenta; misleading regulators about the existence of unfavorable research conducted by its own scientists; and engaging lawyers to review and suggest edits for scientific reports in ways that downplayed worrisome findings.
A detail from a Syngenta internal document about its Swat team.
The files also show that Syngenta created what officials called a “Swat team” to be ready to respond to new independent scientific reports that could interfere with Syngenta’s “freedom to sell” paraquat. The group, also referred to as “Paraquat Communications Management Team”, was to convene “immediately on notification” of the publication of a new study, “triage the situation” and plan a response, including commissioning a “scientific critique”.
A key goal was to “create an international scientific consensus against the hypothesis that paraquat is a risk factor for Parkinson’s disease,” the documents state.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... weedkiller
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"Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears… To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies." -Octavia E. Butler
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Hi jez, Hope your CPAP works well for you.
I have been on CPAP since the '80s. The machines are so much smaller / quieter / better now.
My apnea was very severe the doc (Dr.Kramer iirc) was a pioneer in SA, he had a multi page photo story in National Geographic touting his work.
I don't actually recall the numbers I had that first night (back then the testing was a three day hospitalization with many strange EEG tests and the MMPI including daytime naps) but he told me I had "Babe Ruth" numbers. He offered to take me down to the morgue and show me corpses with higher O2 saturation numbers than I had at times during the night.
Once they put me on CPAP and got the pressures dialed in I got the first good nights sleep I had in many months. Prior to the testing I would wake up in the morning with a splitting headache that cleared up by the time I finished my shower but by that time I was falling asleep again. Things were so bad that I had changed the way I drove to work each day. Instead of taking the slightly shorter Parkway route I switched to the Interstate "circle freeway" because it had rumble strips on the road surfaces edges which would wake me up if I started drifting (I went to work about 4:30 AM to avoid traffic).
The difference the device made was instantaneous and life changing / saving. The first device I got was about the size and configuration of an old style canister vacuum cleaner and just about as loud. It had a belt drive that had a tendency to break or slip off the drive mechanism and a bunch of stuff hanging off the front (a thing called a Non-Rebreathing valve but no humidifier system). Traveling (I was flying a lot for work then) was a PITA also because there was no way I was going to check it as baggage and not always but often the gate folks were completely flummoxed and treated me like some wild eyed terrorist.
TL;DR I hope you have as good an experience with yours as I have had with mine.
p.s. For completenes sake I should add that along the way I had the Phillips device that caused all sorts of health issues but I got away with just a touch of asthma.
I have been on CPAP since the '80s. The machines are so much smaller / quieter / better now.
My apnea was very severe the doc (Dr.Kramer iirc) was a pioneer in SA, he had a multi page photo story in National Geographic touting his work.
I don't actually recall the numbers I had that first night (back then the testing was a three day hospitalization with many strange EEG tests and the MMPI including daytime naps) but he told me I had "Babe Ruth" numbers. He offered to take me down to the morgue and show me corpses with higher O2 saturation numbers than I had at times during the night.
Once they put me on CPAP and got the pressures dialed in I got the first good nights sleep I had in many months. Prior to the testing I would wake up in the morning with a splitting headache that cleared up by the time I finished my shower but by that time I was falling asleep again. Things were so bad that I had changed the way I drove to work each day. Instead of taking the slightly shorter Parkway route I switched to the Interstate "circle freeway" because it had rumble strips on the road surfaces edges which would wake me up if I started drifting (I went to work about 4:30 AM to avoid traffic).
The difference the device made was instantaneous and life changing / saving. The first device I got was about the size and configuration of an old style canister vacuum cleaner and just about as loud. It had a belt drive that had a tendency to break or slip off the drive mechanism and a bunch of stuff hanging off the front (a thing called a Non-Rebreathing valve but no humidifier system). Traveling (I was flying a lot for work then) was a PITA also because there was no way I was going to check it as baggage and not always but often the gate folks were completely flummoxed and treated me like some wild eyed terrorist.
TL;DR I hope you have as good an experience with yours as I have had with mine.
p.s. For completenes sake I should add that along the way I had the Phillips device that caused all sorts of health issues but I got away with just a touch of asthma.
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Just make sure you keep your CPAP clean. My sister didn't do something she was supposed to - I guess - and ended up with pneumonia. She now rinses out the hose every morning.
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There are products marketed as cleaning your CPAP via ionization or ozone or some such thing. Be wary of these. As I understand it the worst of the issues with the Phillips device came about as a result of an interaction between the product and sound deadening material in the CPAP device. And yes Keeping the hose, mask, headgear, clean and changing the filters regularly is an excellent practice, as is using distilled water in the humidifier chamber and cleaning the chamber thoroughly and often.MN-Skeptic wrote: ↑Fri Jun 02, 2023 3:13 pm Just make sure you keep your CPAP clean. My sister didn't do something she was supposed to - I guess - and ended up with pneumonia. She now rinses out the hose every morning.
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Happy National Donut Day
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So you meant, "Boko Haram dominated areas."
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The mask was rinsed this morning after I got up and I have 2 gallons of distilled water by my bed. Might be enough for a couple of nights.qbawl wrote: ↑Fri Jun 02, 2023 3:33 pmThere are products marketed as cleaning your CPAP via ionization or ozone or some such thing. Be wary of these. As I understand it the worst of the issues with the Phillips device came about as a result of an interaction between the product and sound deadening material in the CPAP device. And yes Keeping the hose, mask, headgear, clean and changing the filters regularly is an excellent practice, as is using distilled water in the humidifier chamber and cleaning the chamber thoroughly and often.MN-Skeptic wrote: ↑Fri Jun 02, 2023 3:13 pm Just make sure you keep your CPAP clean. My sister didn't do something she was supposed to - I guess - and ended up with pneumonia. She now rinses out the hose every morning.
I wouldn't say I had the best sleep of my life last night, but it was better than usual. I am surprised how quiet that machine is. I think the humidifier I have is louder.
The tech who helped me get the mask fitted and everything was extremely thorough explaining everything. The I read the manual, because of course I did. The hose only needs to be cleaned with soap and water once a week. They will replace it every three months. I may get an extra just in case though. The masks are replaced every month.
I'm hoping I get more used to the mask. That was the only thing really bothering me last night. But otherwise very happy.
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You will get used to it. Mr520 was shocked by his sleep study, after years of denying that he even snored. “It’s just a little buzz! You snore too” as if it was a character flaw. Ninety-nine(99!) times an hour! Basically he never slept. It took him less than a week to get used to the mask and now he won’t go without it. He just bought a tiny portable machine -a cylinder about yay big - for his raft trip next week.
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Getting a CPAP was life changing for me, and I cannot advocate for them enough.
My apnea was weight related (it isn't always that) and I lost so much weight I no longer need it, but back when I did, the difference it made...wow.
The only problem I ever had with mine was the cat would occasionally walk across it & hit the power button, for a rude awakening.
My apnea was weight related (it isn't always that) and I lost so much weight I no longer need it, but back when I did, the difference it made...wow.
The only problem I ever had with mine was the cat would occasionally walk across it & hit the power button, for a rude awakening.
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I've been known to roll over onto the tubing, mostly cutting it off...Estiveo wrote: ↑Sat Jun 03, 2023 5:11 pm Getting a CPAP was life changing for me, and I cannot advocate for them enough.
My apnea was weight related (it isn't always that) and I lost so much weight I no longer need it, but back when I did, the difference it made...wow.
The only problem I ever had with mine was the cat would occasionally walk across it & hit the power button, for a rude awakening.
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I have been on CPAP so long that it is now the status quo and there is no way I can fall asleep without it. I have never found "Miss Goodmask" if you will! I am currently using the EVRO mask but some nights I score very low on the mask seal component and yet my events per hour remain low (less than 3 per hour) which seems counter intuitive.
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I don't use a CPAP but I do go through about a gallon of distilled water a week for sinus rinses (Yes, it's disgusting. No, I don't want to talk about it.) I don't know about the rest of the country but we're still having periodic distilled water shortages. They don't last as long but there are still times when all the grocery stores are out for a few days. Oddly, I can sometimes find it at Menards (Midwest regional big box home center) when everybody else is out. Anyway, I've learned to keep extra distilled water on hand just in case. Something to keep in mind.
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After amateur diagnosing (correctly) several friends with sleep apnea based on symptoms, etc., it occurred to me that was I was drowsy during the day-enough to fall asleep at work. I took naps most Saturday afternoons. Maybe I should get a sleep study...
The technician said it was painful watching me struggle to breathe. Worst case he'd seen.
I got used to CPAP quickly. It was psychological. I felt a lot better with it than without it. Sleep deprivation makes me ill.
The only problem I have is when I'm congested with a cold (or the one case of COVID), where I can't breathe through my nose.
I would like to lose enough weight to lose it. It's not attractive, and I'd like to be less dependent on medical interventions like CPAP.
The technician said it was painful watching me struggle to breathe. Worst case he'd seen.
I got used to CPAP quickly. It was psychological. I felt a lot better with it than without it. Sleep deprivation makes me ill.
The only problem I have is when I'm congested with a cold (or the one case of COVID), where I can't breathe through my nose.
I would like to lose enough weight to lose it. It's not attractive, and I'd like to be less dependent on medical interventions like CPAP.
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this is a REAL VR game being ported to the Quest2 VR headset. I
can hear the orgasmic moaning from the Anti-Rainbow Coalition® 2023
can hear the orgasmic moaning from the Anti-Rainbow Coalition® 2023
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Amazon and Google fund anti-abortion lawmakers through complex shell game
Blue-chip companies gave to Republican group funneling money to lawmakers who overturned abortion-ban veto in North Carolina
Nick Robins-Early
Sat 3 Jun 2023 12.00 BST
As North Carolina’s 12-week abortion ban is due to come into effect on 1 July, an analysis from the non-profit Center for Political Accountability (CPA) shows several major corporations donated large sums to a Republican political organization which in turn funded groups working to elect anti-abortion state legislators.
The Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC) received donations of tens of thousands of dollars each from corporations including Comcast, Intuit, Wells Fargo, Amazon, Bank of America and Google last year, the CPA’s analysis of IRS filings shows. The contributions were made in the months after Politico published a leaked supreme court decision indicating that the court would end the right to nationwide abortion access.
Google contributed $45,000 to the RSLC after the leak of the draft decision, according to the CPA’s review of the tax filings. Others contributed even more in the months after the leak, including Amazon ($50,000), Intuit ($100,000) and Comcast ($147,000).
Google, Amazon, Comcast, Wells Fargo and Bank of America did not respond to requests for comment. An Intuit spokesperson pointed out that the company also donates to Democratic political organizations, and that “our financial support does not indicate a full endorsement of every position taken by an individual policymaker or organization.
“Intuit is non-partisan and works with policymakers and leaders from both sides of the aisle to advocate for our customers,” an Intuit spokesperson said in a statement. “We believe engagement with policymakers is essential to a robust democracy and political giving is just one of the many ways Intuit engages on behalf of its customers, employees, and the communities it serves.”
A Bank of America spokesperson pointed to the company’s policy that donations to so-called 527 organizations such as the RSLC come with the caveat that they only be used for operational and administrative purposes, not to support any candidates or ballot initiatives. The CPA, meanwhile, argues that since the RSLC’s operations are explicitly designed to support candidates and ballot initiatives, such a policy is a distinction without a difference.
Although these companies did not directly give these vast sums to North Carolina’s anti-abortion lawmakers, the CPA’s analysis is a case study in how corporate contributions to organizations such as the RSLC can end up being funneled into anti-abortion causes. When Republican state legislators successfully overturned a veto from the Democratic governor last month to pass the upcoming abortion ban, nine of lawmakers voting to overturn the veto had received campaign contributions from a group with links to the RSLC.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... gle-comcas
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with an UK twist
I love electric vehicles – and was an early adopter. But increasingly I feel duped
Sadly, keeping your old petrol car may be better than buying an EV. There are sound environmental reasons not to jump just yet
Rowan Atkinson
Sat 3 Jun 2023 08.00 BST
Electric motoring is, in theory, a subject about which I should know something. My first university degree was in electrical and electronic engineering, with a subsequent master’s in control systems. Combine this, perhaps surprising, academic pathway with a lifelong passion for the motorcar, and you can see why I was drawn into an early adoption of electric vehicles. I bought my first electric hybrid 18 years ago and my first pure electric car nine years ago and (notwithstanding our poor electric charging infrastructure) have enjoyed my time with both very much. Electric vehicles may be a bit soulless, but they’re wonderful mechanisms: fast, quiet and, until recently, very cheap to run. But increasingly, I feel a little duped. When you start to drill into the facts, electric motoring doesn’t seem to be quite the environmental panacea it is claimed to be.
As you may know, the government has proposed a ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2030. The problem with the initiative is that it seems to be based on conclusions drawn from only one part of a car’s operating life: what comes out of the exhaust pipe. Electric cars, of course, have zero exhaust emissions, which is a welcome development, particularly in respect of the air quality in city centres. But if you zoom out a bit and look at a bigger picture that includes the car’s manufacture, the situation is very different. In advance of the Cop26 climate conference in Glasgow in 2021, Volvo released figures claiming that greenhouse gas emissions during production of an electric car are 70% higher than when manufacturing a petrol one. How so? The problem lies with the lithium-ion batteries fitted currently to nearly all electric vehicles: they’re absurdly heavy, many rare earth metals and huge amounts of energy are required to make them, and they only last about 10 years. It seems a perverse choice of hardware with which to lead the automobile’s fight against the climate crisis.
Unsurprisingly, a lot of effort is going into finding something better. New, so-called solid-state batteries are being developed that should charge more quickly and could be about a third of the weight of the current ones – but they are years away from being on sale, by which time, of course, we will have made millions of overweight electric cars with rapidly obsolescing batteries. Hydrogen is emerging as an interesting alternative fuel, even though we are slow in developing a truly “green” way of manufacturing it. It can be used in one of two ways. It can power a hydrogen fuel cell (essentially, a kind of battery); the car manufacturer Toyota has poured a lot of money into the development of these. Such a system weighs half of an equivalent lithium-ion battery and a car can be refuelled with hydrogen at a filling station as fast as with petrol.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... n-atkinson
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Three days on the CPAP and I'm getting more used to the mask. Sleepiness is much less during the day. I don't even feel like taking a nap. One issue though.
My data is not uploading to the site. This data is vital for making sure I'm using it enough for insurance to cover it. By digging a bit in the settings, it seems they us T-Mobile as the signal carrier (4G). I even took it outside and plugged it in. 1 bar. Inside is also 1 bar on the signal.
Have a message in to tech support to see if there is a way to boost the signal.
My data is not uploading to the site. This data is vital for making sure I'm using it enough for insurance to cover it. By digging a bit in the settings, it seems they us T-Mobile as the signal carrier (4G). I even took it outside and plugged it in. 1 bar. Inside is also 1 bar on the signal.
Have a message in to tech support to see if there is a way to boost the signal.
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That's what the micro chip in the machine is for (assuming you have a Resmed, or that all cpap's have them). I live in the boonies, and the first two or three years I had my cpap, I had no reception either. I just brought the chip with me to my appointments and they read it on the spot. The doctors are used to this; rural areas were off the cell network for decades until very recently. They'll know what to do. Recommend that you talk to your doc's support staff, and let them deal with the insurance company. It'll work out.jez wrote: ↑Sun Jun 04, 2023 2:09 pm Three days on the CPAP and I'm getting more used to the mask. Sleepiness is much less during the day. I don't even feel like taking a nap. One issue though.
My data is not uploading to the site. This data is vital for making sure I'm using it enough for insurance to cover it. By digging a bit in the settings, it seems they us T-Mobile as the signal carrier (4G). I even took it outside and plugged it in. 1 bar. Inside is also 1 bar on the signal.
Have a message in to tech support to see if there is a way to boost the signal.
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There is an SD card option. Would be easy enough to get one, but it needs to be formatted to the machine, which is what i need to do. I have 90 days to get the info to the insurance company, so I should be fine there. Just makes me a bit grumpy. I live in a large city, not rural. I should have a signal from a major carrier. But nope. Nada.p0rtia wrote: ↑Sun Jun 04, 2023 3:10 pm
That's what the micro chip in the machine is for (assuming you have a Resmed, or that all cpap's have them). I live in the boonies, and the first two or three years I had my cpap, I had no reception either. I just brought the chip with me to my appointments and they read it on the spot. The doctors are used to this; rural areas were off the cell network for decades until very recently. They'll know what to do. Recommend that you talk to your doc's support staff, and let them deal with the insurance company. It'll work out.
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The machine will format the sd card itself when it sees a new card without its special format. My older ResMed S9 unit runs with a 2GB card and stores well a year of data. So any low capacity sd card (16GB?) will suffice even for newer models. Note/warning: never put a ResMed card into a Windows machine except you set the switch on the card to lock/protected. Otherwise Windows will try to write stuff onto the card and the ResMed software will not like that and reformat the card (at least on older models).jez wrote: ↑Sun Jun 04, 2023 6:44 pm
There is an SD card option. Would be easy enough to get one, but it needs to be formatted to the machine, which is what i need to do. I have 90 days to get the info to the insurance company, so I should be fine there. Just makes me a bit grumpy. I live in a large city, not rural. I should have a signal from a major carrier. But nope. Nada.
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Welcome to the Medieval Kingdom of MAGAdonia. Where superstition thrives
and now, the rest of the story: https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/ ... -morrison/In medieval times, it was believed that pregnancy and certain medical conditions were caused by the demons Incubus and Succubus that would invade the body during sleep. As bizarre as it may seem, the role of spiritual demons influencing human reproduction was recently championed by a medical group leader with other physicians standing nearby in nodding approval.
In a few months, a recently passed law will go into effect in Florida that would not only allow medical practitioners in Florida to espouse such dangerous myths and beliefs without recourse but also deny medical care based on personal beliefs — no matter how outrageous or wrong.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va ... -maryland/
Fighter jets from Joint Base Andrews were scrambled to intercept a private plane over Virginia on Sunday afternoon, causing a sonic boom that reverberated across the area, North American Aerospace Defense Command officials said.
The jets were responding to a Cessna that crashed later in Southwest Virginia, NORAD said in a statement issued Sunday night. F-16 jets from Andrews were scrambled, and the Cessna was unresponsive when hailed by authorities.
It is unclear why the Cessna did not respond or why it crashed later. Three people with knowledge of the event, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly, said the military did not shoot the plane down and there is no indication that the military caused the crash. The jets used flares to try to get the Cessna pilot’s attention, NORAD said.
The Cessna was intercepted at about 3:20 p.m., but the pilot remained unresponsive and crashed near the George Washington National Forest, officials said. Officials with the National Transportation Safety Board said the plane had been unresponsive to air traffic control communications before it crashed.
"Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears… To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies." -Octavia E. Butler