Glyphosate doesn't accumulate in mother's milk: study

Glyphosate, the most used weed-killing chemical in the world, does not accumulate over time in human breast milk, a new study has found.
The study led by Michelle McGuire, associate professor in the Washington State University School of Biological Sciences, showed that glyphosate, the main ingredient in the herbicide Roundup, does not accumulate over time in human milk.
The US Environmental Protection Agency used the study as part of an ongoing review of glyphosate regulations prompted by public concern over a controversial report on the chemical released by the advocacy group Moms Across America last year.
"Our study provides strong evidence that glyphosate is not in human milk. The MAA findings are unverified, not consistent with published safety data and are based off an assay designed to test for glyphosate in water, not breast milk," said McGuire.

The Moms Across America and Sustainable Pulse study claimed that traces of glyphosate were found in three out of ten breast milk samples submitted for analysis.
In the new study, McGuire and her colleagues collected milk and urine samples from 41 lactating women living in or near the cities of Moscow in Idaho and Pullman in Washington.

The area is a highly productive agricultural region where glyphosate is routinely used in farming practices.
Ten of the women reported living on or directly adjacent to a farm or ranch, 23 of the women described their personal diet as conventional and five had personally mixed or applied glyphosate sometime in the past.

Milk and urine samples were analysed for glyphosate and glyphosate metabolites using high sensitivity liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry methods specifically optimised for the task.
The study detected neither glyphosate nor any glyphosate metabolites in any milk sample, even when the mother had detectable amounts of glyphosate in her urine.
Additionally, no relationship was found between subjects who self-identified as consumers of conventionally grown foods instead of organics and urinary glyphosate levels, nor was there a difference between women who lived on or near a farm and those who lived in an urban or suburban non-farming area.
Analyses of the milk samples were also independently verified at Wisconsin-based Covance Laboratories, which is not affiliated with the WSU/UI research team.

"In conclusion, our data - obtained using sophisticated and validated methods of analyses - strongly suggest that glyphosate does not bioaccumulate and is not present in human milk even when the mother has detectable glyphosate in her urine," McGuire said.
"These findings emphasise the critical importance of carefully validating laboratory methods to the biological matrix of interest, especially when it is as complex as human milk," McGuire added.