Letter to the Comox Valley Echo newspaper about the safety of engineered food I don’t need to respond to Mr Grant’s further disparaging comments but I do want to respond to Professor Paul Horgen’s letter of September 17. I wrote to Dr. Horgen in January to give him the scientific references he required to change his opinion of the safety of engineered crops. A genetic engineer in London England compiled last year the recent scientific literature on the subject, had it summarized in plain English by a brilliant science writer and made it available for free online. The report is called GMO Myths and Truths - download it from earthopensource.org The compilation includes research on potentially toxic proteins in most engineered crops, well documented in European research. It is public knowledge that the expert toxicologists of the Food and Drug Administration in the US predicted in 1996 that engineered crops would contain rogue proteins that could be allergenic, or toxic in other ways. In spite of their warnings, the testing has not been done in the USA and definitely not in Canada. I don’t necessarily disagree that we have the best regulatory federal agencies in the world. But on that one, they simply do what the FDA does. They require absolutely no testing. Any study by Industry is voluntary and we don’t need to know. The credo of safety is repeated by federal agencies, governments, and even the scientific community. I can’t speak for the federal agencies or the governments, but it is obvious when one looks carefully that a great majority of “scientists” and even “scientific organizations” are looked after by the chemical Industry. Like a slight “conflict of interest” to really be allowed much of a voice. But instead this “scientific community” – mostly in North America, is amazingly loud. “The European research results cannot be correct”. “Their science is second rate”. “They really don’t know what they are doing.” I think the Europeans are just regular folks who report what they find ? That mice and rats suffer organ damage after feeding for months on engineered grain – laced with the herbicide. I have seen a few references more recently, giving me cause for even more alarm. I am only waking up to the fact that RoundUp the herbicide used with all herbicide tolerant crops is an antibiotic. It is patented as an antibiotic and it does a number on our intestinal flora. Now, that’s dangerous. RoundUp residues must be pretty high in all foods containing engineered ingredients and RoundUp has been shown to be antibiotic in parts per million. That alone could explain the epidemic increases of the last 20 years of heart disease, gastrointestinal disorders, diabetes, infertility and cancer. All these symptoms have been seen in mice and rats eating engineered grains. So whether it is about RoundUp or engineered crops – they travel together, there seems to be a serious block to accepting that the Europeans and most of the rest of the world don’t want engineered food because they know something we don’t. Go ahead, check it out ! GMO Myths and Truths download it from earthopensource.org And please Professor Horgen, report back on what you learned, I will enjoy our conversation. Dr. Vrain
Posted on: Wed, 18 Sep 2013 03:26:45 +0000