Jonathan Lundgren, an entomologist with eleven years as a scientist with the USDA’s Agriculture Research Service, filed a whistleblower complaint last month (October 2015) alleging that the federal agency suppressed the results of his research on “neonics”, which indicate serious harms of this class of pesticides to polllinators.
As noted by Carey Gillam in the Bee Buzz blog of Bee Culture Magazine, Lundgren is the first to file a formal complaint in the wake of questions about the scientific integrity of research by USDA scientists, which highlight the suppression of scientific findings on a range of topics that contradict the interests of powerful corporations.
Following submission to a scientific journal of Lundgren’s research indicating the harms of “neonics” to honeybees and Monarch butterflies, USDA managers blocked publication of his research, barred him from talking to the media, and disrupted operations at the laboratory he oversaw, according to the complaint filed with the federal Merit Systems Protection Board.
Gary Rondeau
Madronna Holden
ibeephilip
kenabis419
Oregon Sustainable Beekeepers 