It appears that Alex Jones, a controversial media figure who was banned across all big social media platforms for his views on a number of issues was onto something when he said a while back that frogs were turning gay when exposed to a common pesticide called Atrazine.

His views were echoed by Democratic party candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. during an interview with psychologist Jordan Peterson which has been taken down from YouTube.

Atrazine, one of the most commonly used and controversial weedkillers, can turn male frogs into females, according to researchers.

The experiment is the first to show such complete effects of atrazine, which had been known to disrupt hormones and which is one of the chief suspects in the decline of amphibians such as frogs around the world.

“Atrazine-exposed males were both demasculinized (chemically castrated) and completely feminized as adults,” Tyrone Hayes of the University of California Berkeley and colleagues wrote in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The chemical had been shown to disrupt development and make frogs develop both male and female features — termed hermaphroditism. This study of 40 male frogs shows the process can go even further, Hayes said.

“Before, we knew we got fewer males than we should have, and we got hermaphrodites. Now, we have clearly shown that many of these animals are sex-reversed males,” Hayes said in a statement.

“Atrazine has caused a hormonal imbalance that has made them develop into the wrong sex, in terms of their genetic constitution.”

SIMILAR EFFECTS ON HUMANS?
Whether the effects translate to humans is far from clear. Frogs have thin skin that can absorb chemicals easily and they literally bathe in the polluted water.

The European Union banned atrazine in 2004. The finding may add pressure to the United States to more closely regulate the chemical, used widely in agriculture.

“Approximately 80 million pounds (36,287 tonnes) are applied annually in the United States alone, and atrazine is the most common pesticide contaminant of ground and surface water,” the researchers wrote.

“Atrazine can be transported more than 1,000 km (621 miles) from the point of application via rainfall and, as a result, contaminates otherwise pristine habitats, even in remote areas where it is not used,” they added, citing other researchers.

“In fact, more than a half million pounds (227 tonnes) of atrazine are precipitated in rainfall each year in the United States.”

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said in October it was reviewing the health impacts of atrazine.

source reuters