Yesterday, I criticized Outside magazine for a story claiming that the herbicide Roundup (glyphosate) could be causing a frightening rise in celiac disease–hypersensitivity to gluten.
That post left out what appears to be a very important chart, from the journal Interdisciplinary Toxicology. Here it is:
The correlation between glyphosate use on wheat (the curve) and the incidence of celiac disease (the yellow bars) seems to be nearly exact. How could this possibly be due to chance?
Case closed, you might say. Glyphosate is indeed the likely cause of the rise in celiac disease.
Before you pronounce a verdict, however, you might want to consider this chart:
Or perhaps this one:
These charts, and others like them, come from a website called spurious correlations, by Tyler Vigen, who identifies himself as a student at Harvard Law School. Vigen–it's hard to imagine how he finds time for this as a law student–"proves" all kinds of things with his charts. For example, did you know that U.S. spending on science, space and technology closely tracks suicides by hanging, strangulation, and suffocation? That's Vigen's latest discovery, so to speak.
Here's what he says about his work:
I created this website as a fun way to look at correlations and to think about data. Empirical research is interesting, and I love to wonder about how variables work together. The charts on this site aren't meant to imply causation nor are they meant to create a distrust for research or even correlative data. Rather, I hope this projects fosters interest in statistics and numerical research.
Check out his site for his favorite books on math and statistics. And wish him well in his "research."
Now what were we saying about glyphosate and gluten?
-Paul Raeburn
I appreciate the caution to not confuse correlation with causation, but I find your point rather pointless. What I glean from the studies and the researchers careful words is that much more research needs to be done. There is a reason so many people feel better when they stop eating wheat/grains/gluten, we just don’t know why. There is the ironic possibility that efforts by farmers to save their fields could be compromising the end product. I am wondering if your assessment of the issue may be the one that is a bit premature.
“Because glyphosate cannot be sprayed on most actively growing, non-GE plants, residues of glyphosate in food have been rare, at least until the expansion ~ 2006 in the number of late-season glyphosate applications on wheat and barley as a harvest aid and/or to control escaped weeds” http://bit.ly/1nSQn5A
You should check her use of USDA data. She claims glyphosate is spray on wheat. It is not, USDA surveys says ” on wheat ground for crop year, which is from the day after last crop is harvested until current crop is harvested” The “crop year” could be up to 24 months in some winter wheat rotations, lots of time to apply glyphosate before wheat is ever planted. Her chart show an increase of about 2.5 x, while the increase use of glyphosate is 18 times. She skewed the chart to show similar curves.