Could Monsanto Destroy Irelands Farmers

Ballantine wrote: »

I've never understood why GM foods are so terrible for humans. Anyone who eats tomato puree eats GM foods, for example, and many varieties of imported rice are GM. The only evidence we have as to their effects on health is we are all living longer and in better health than our parents or grandparents.

Where is the problem?

djpbarry wrote: »

Maybe you could first answer the question(s) that have been put to you?

djpbarry wrote: »

I really, really doubt that. Got a source?

More than 60 percent of U.S. cancer deaths are caused by smoking and diet.

djpbarry wrote: »

How do you know it's not flying spaghetti monsters?

A landmark court case has ruled there is a link between using a mobile phone and brain tumours, paving the way for a flood of legal actions.

It also warned that "exposure should not be higher than needed to achieve the intended purpose."

"cancer registries should follow the development of cancer incidence in the future and research should not cease"

Ballantine wrote: »

If you believe that humans in the USA and Europe are not living longer, and healthier, lives than did our ancestors, then we disagree.

Ballantine wrote: »

It's also ironic that you imply that it's ok for science to try to cure cancers, or to try to treat patients with cancer with all sorts of treatments, but not ok for science to try to find ways of producing foods more efficiently or in ways which necessitate less pesticides which, in turn, mean less pesticide residues ingested by the very humans you say you are concerned for.

Toxic pesticides which are implanted into genetically modified food crops have lodged in the blood of pregnant women and their unborn babies, research shows.

Traces of the toxin were found 93 per cent of the pregnant mothers and in 80 per cent of the umbilical cords.

The findings appear to contradict the GM industry’s long-standing claim that any potentially harmful chemicals added to crops would pass safely through the body.

To date, most of the global research which has been used to demonstrate the safety of GM crops has been funded by the industry itself.

Most worrisome, say the authors of the Global Citizens' Report on the State of GMOs, is the greatly increased use of synthetic chemicals, used to control pests despite biotech companies' justification that GM-engineered crops would reduce insecticide use.

In China, where insect-resistant Bt cotton is widely planted, populations of pests that previously posed only minor problems have increased 12-fold since 1997.

A 2008 study in the International Journal of Biotechnology found that any benefits of planting Bt cotton have been eroded by the increasing use of pesticides needed to combat them.

Additionally, soya growers in Argentina and Brazil have been found to use twice as much herbicide on their GM as they do on conventional crops, and a survey by Navdanya International, in India, showed that pesticide use increased 13-fold since Bt cotton was introduced.

Ballantine wrote: »

GM food has nothing to do with obesity.

Oregano_State wrote: »

@Rucking Fetard, if you didn't already know that this was the case then you should have read up on it instead of displaying your ignorance of the topic you're attempting to discuss for all to see.

djpbarry wrote: »

And where is the scientific evidence in support of their decision? I’ll give you a clue – there is none:
http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100517/full/news.2010.246.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=urIjObLVlKE

djpbarry wrote: »

The paper on which that article is supposedly based does not even mention the word “obesity”:
http://www.biolsci.org/v05p0706.pdf

Crude and relative liver weights are also affected at the end of the maximal (33%) GM maize feeding level as well as that of the heart which for corresponding parameters to a comparable extent, showed up to an 11% weight increase.
***
Additional statistically significant differences include … higher … overall body (3.7%) weight …
***
Several parameters indicate increases in circulating glucose and triglyceride levels, with liver function parameters disrupted together with a slight increase in total body weight. This physiological state is indicative of a pre-diabetic profile.
***
Our data strongly suggests that these GM maize varieties induce a state of hepatorenal [i.e. kidney and liver] toxicity.
***
This can be due to the new pesticides (herbicide or insecticide) present specifically in each type of GM maize, although unintended metabolic effects due to the mutagenic properties of the GM transformation process cannot be excluded [Remember that some GM crops are engineered to have the plants produce their own pesticides, some pesticides can cause obesity, and the pesticides are not magically destroyed before making it into our bloodstream]. All three GM maize varieties contain a distinctly different pesticide residue associated with their particular GM event (glyphosate and AMPA in NK 603, modified Cry1Ab in MON 810, modified Cry3Bb1 in MON 863). These substances have never before been an integral part of the human or animal diet and therefore their health consequences for those who consume them, especially over long time periods are currently unknown.

djpbarry wrote: »

Oh I'm sorry - I didn't realise science had an expiry date.

You might be interested to know that the study on which the Italian courts based their decision is several years older.

djpbarry wrote: »

That's not at all how I remember it.

two wheels good wrote: »

I want to add a point on "Generally Regarded as Safe" - a topic I remembered last night that's worth mentioning. It reveals the level of influence GM corps. had on govt. policy in the USA
I'd better offer a link to avoid accusations of innuendo and half-truths (is that a euphemism for lying?)

Extract from here but other references also available online.

"So GMOs could theoretically be unsafe to eat. What does science tell us about the matter? Unfortunately, not much. Back in 1992, before the first GM seed had been commercially planted, the FDA declared GM foods to be “generally regarded as safe” — despite a complete absence of rigorous testing. And that meant that safety testing is completely unnecessary if, say, Monsanto wants to bring a novel crop to market. In a peer-reviewed 2004 paper [PDF] — which remains an extremely useful primer on regulation of GM crops — William Freese and David Shubert show that the FDA made the “generally regarded as safe” decision over the objections of several agency scientists, who saw significant potential for harm. Moreover, when the agency rubber-stamps the introduction of a GM crop into the food supply, it does so using extremely non-committal language. "

It's worth reading the complete article.

Oh, and then there's the saga of Monsanto's bovine growth hormone. That's a GMO too. Not only did they successfully lobby to have that approved against strong opposition they even quashed any requirement for consumer label referring to it on milk labels. Can I really be blamed for any cynicism?

This supposition is strengthened by reports concerning independent
researchers who have been denied GE crop material by companies, or whose access to such material is strictly conditioned (Dalton 2002). Thus, the validity of a claim that GE crop X is safe depends almost
exclusively upon the quality of both the relevant corporate science and the regulatory approval process.

Here, we will undertake a science-based critique of corporate scientific practices and the US regulatory
system with respect to GE foods,

Regulation of genetically engineered foods is divided among three federal agencies. The breakdown of
regulatory responsibility is as follows:
* The US Department of Agriculture oversees GE crop field trials and is responsible for deregulating
(i.e. permitting the unregulated cultivation and sale of) GE crops.
* The Environmental Protection Agency has jurisdiction over the pesticides in GE pesticidal plants, and
has joint responsibility with the Food and Drug Administration for selectable marker genes and
proteins used in crop development; and
* The Food and Drug Administration conducts voluntary consultations on other aspects of GE foods
with those companies that choose to consult with it.

However, USDA’s recent admission that there have been 115 compliance
infractions by GE crop field trial operators raises serious doubts as to the efficacy of its regulation (USDA
Compliance 2003). Two contamination episodes involving field trials of biopharmaceutical corn in the
fall of 2002 highlight the inadequacy of USDA’s oversight in this regard (Ferber 2003).





However, the EPA has failed to establish data requirements specific to plant
pesticides (EPA PIP, 2001). In the meantime, the Agency has referred developers of GE pesticideproducing
crops to a nearly decade-old guidance (EPA Statement of Policy 1994). This Statement of
Policy devotes just 4 short paragraphs to testing for human health effects. The Agency recommends only
that companies conduct short-term oral toxicity tests in rodents and in vitro digestibility tests on the plant
pesticide, without any guidance on or specification of test conditions.





Food additives must
undergo extensive pre-market safety testing, including long-term animal studies, unless they are deemed
to be “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS). The FDA has left it up to the biotech industry to decide
whether or not a transgenic protein is GRAS, and so exempt from testing (FDA Policy, 1992).

This blanket GRAS exemption is based on the notion of “substantial equivalence” – the strong, a priori
presumption that GE crops are largely the same as their conventional counterparts.

FDA scientists at the
Division of Food Chemistry and Technology and the Division of Contaminants Chemistry called for
mandatory review,

Administrative superiors at the FDA and the White House apparently did not heed these concerns,
resulting in today’s voluntary consultation process.

The review process outlined above makes it clear that, contrary to popular belief, the FDA has not
formally approved a single GE crop as safe for human consumption.





SURROGATE PROTEINS
Biotechnology companies rarely test the transgenic protein actually produced in their engineered crops.
Instead, for testing purposes they make use of a bacterially generated surrogate protein that may differ in
important respects from the plant-produced one. The same genetic construct used to transform the plant
is expressed in bacteria (usually E. coli), and the surrogate transgenic protein is then extracted from the
bacteria. This surrogate protein is then employed for all subsequent testing, such as short-term animal
feeding studies and allergenicity assessments. This is, however, a serious mistake in testing paradigms,
since plants and bacteria are very likely to produce different proteins even when transformed with the
7
same gene (for discussion, see Schubert, 2002).

Oregano_State wrote: »

It's not my job to educate you. It is your choice to continue to produce opinions on subjects you don't understand very well.

Oregano_State wrote: »

Also, that video is silly.