I think you make a grave mistake to compare Roundup to lead poisoning, or tobacco smoking, or any of these other tragic miscalculations. 

This is the same mistake people make when they refer to table sugar as poisonous and addictive. It takes the discussion out of the rational sphere and into the realm of paranoia. 

Lead poisoning was identified more than 100 years ago, you can read about it here: Oliver, T. (1885). A Clinical Lecture on Lead-Poisoning. British medical journal, 2(1294), 731.

There is no question that the chief problem with herbicide and pesticide use is that they are abused. The newer, safer ones have simply led to gross over-application. 

But this is a separate problem from the actual products, which are safer than their precursors (like paraquat, parathion, etc). Lead was used in agriculture and very early on it was replaced when less toxic alternatives were discovered. 

Even so, the dose makes the poison, there are probably safe levels of almost every known toxin.  Our challenge is to find those correct levels, to eliminate unnecessary use of chemicals, to find safer alternatives. 

Given the current EPA, however, things are likely to get a lot worse before they get better. 

PLB

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