Genetically-modified foods or GMOs (genetically-modified organisms) usually refers to crop plants created for human or animal consumption using molecular biology techniques.
Instead of using conventional methods of breeding which require precious time and a hit-or-miss approach, GMOs have been modified in a laboratory to enhance desired traits rapidly and with exact precision. Scientists can isolate a gene responsible for drought or disease tolerance in one plant, transfer the gene into a different plant, and the plant with the transferred gene will then be drought or disease tolerant as well.
The gene being transferred does not have to come from a plant, it can be from a non-plant organism. For example, B.t. (Bacillus thuringiensis) is a soil-dwelling bacterium commonly used as a biological alternative to pesticides. It produces crystal proteins that are lethal to insect larvae. Those crystal protein genes have been transferred into corn, enabling the corn to produce its own pesticides against insects.
Criticisms involving gene transfer have been against agribusiness for pursuing profit without the concern and necessary research for potential hazards and also against the government for neglecting regulatory oversight.
Unintended consequences
Since there is no way to design a B.t. toxin that can target pesky insects and remain harmless to other insects, B.t. toxins kill indiscriminately. A laboratory study conducted over ten years ago* has shown that pollen from B.t. corn caused high numbers of the monarch butterfly caterpillar to die. Even though they don't feed on corn, the pollen from the B.t. corn can be blown by the wind onto milkweed plants in neighboring fields which monarch butterflies do feed on.
Another concern is that insects will in time get stronger as they develop a resistance to crops that produce their own pesticides because of gene modification.
Besides bringing about "super-insects," crop plants engineered for herbicide tolerance could cross-breed with weeds, thus forming herbicide-resistant "superweeds." Cross-pollination can also occur between fields, and farmers who want nothing to do with GM crops may have to live with them anyway.
There are possible solutions to the above problems such as creating GM plants that are sterile and do not produce pollen. Another solution, depending on acreage needed, would be to require a planted buffer zone of non-GM crops around the GM crops.
However, we should proceed with caution to avoid causing unintended harm to human health and the environment. Already, though, even without proper testing, GMO corn is widely used in thousands of processed foods found in grocery stores. The FDA's position is that GM foods are substantially equivalent to non-GM foods; more stringent labeling not required.
"Scientists have been saying they're only turning one thing off, but that switch is connected to another switch and another switch," said Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of the Center for Food Safety. "You can't just do one thing to nature. It's nice to think so, but it just doesn't work that way."
A developing threat
Monsanto developed a seed to resist weed-killer Roundup, allowing farmers to use the two together to save time and labor on weeding. The use of Roundup via GMO crops "is resulting in the emergence of a deadly new pathogen that's causing widespread spontaneous abortions among cattle. The pathogen appears in high concentrations among even non-GMO crops that are 'managed' through the use of Roundup for weed control...........human consumers are almost certainly being exposed to this pathogen through the food supply right now." Source
This is according to Don M. Huber, a former Emeritus Professor at Purdue University and someone who has worked around pathogens for many decades. He has sent a warning letter regarding this matter to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack.
"We are informing the USDA of our findings at this early stage, specifically due to your pending decision regarding approval of RR alfalfa. Naturally, if either the RR gene or Roundup itself is a promoter or co-factor of this pathogen, then such approval could be a calamity.
There is strong evidence that this infectious agent promotes diseases of both plants and mammals, which is very rare.
Laboratory tests have confirmed the presence of this organism in a wide variety of livestock that have experienced spontaneous abortions and infertility. Preliminary results from ongoing research have also been able to reproduce abortions in a clinical setting. The pathogen may explain the escalating frequency of infertility and spontaneous abortions over the past few years in US cattle, dairy, swine, and horse operations.
It is well-documented that glyphosate promotes soil pathogens and is already implicated with the increase of more than 40 plant diseases; it dismantles plant defenses by chelating vital nutrients; and it reduces the bioavailability of nutrients in feed, which in turn can cause animal disorders.
We are now seeing an unprecedented trend of increasing plant and animal diseases and disorders. This pathogen may be instrumental to understanding and solving this problem."
He requests more investigation "until the causal/predisposing relationship with glyphosate and/or RR (Roundup-ready) plants can be ruled out as a threat to crop and animal production and human health."
In view of the scientific possibility that once these deadly pathogens are out in the wild and there's no recapturing them, it is an understatement to say that his request does not seem unreasonable.
*Transgenic pollen harms monarch larvae, Nature, Vol 399, No 6733, p 214, 1999
"Contamination from GM alfalfa certain," YakimaTV.com
"Genetically modified - that's a bad word in our industry," said Todd Fryhover, president of the apple commission in Washington state, which produces more than half the U.S. crop. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service has considered about 100 petitions for genetically engineered or modified crops. Those that have drawn the most attention have been engineered to withstand certain weed killers."
USDA found to be poisoning bird populations, mass die-offs involving millions of birds
New Research finds that Roundup Ready GMO crops may cause animal miscarriages
Roundup, GMOs linked to emergence of deadly new pathogen causing spontaneous abortions among animals
Comments
Kara....this whole thing concerns me! We cut corners to cut prices, and cut quality.......we are more advanced than a generation ago, but are also more obese, more sick, more everything. Things were good the way God made them.....advances in technology are one thing......but God only knows what it will do to people
You're so right. These modified foods are meant to increase the food supply, but the methods may backfire and start causing a shortage instead.
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