Image by Flickr-user elizaIO, via Flickr CC.
I know we talked about GMOs before, but it seems they have come to a whole different prevalence lately, thanks mainly to this Grist series on Panic-free GMOs. Author Nathanael Johnson goes into minute detail in figuring out everything from what GMOs really are to the literature surrounding it to the regulations attached to them. All of that and more in 26 installments. Now, I have to admit that I haven’t read all of them yet (in fact, I am somewhat stretched for time at the moment because exams never seem to stop here), but from what I have looked at I think Johnson did a wonderful job of doing the research and then presenting it at eye’s level for the normal reader – in fact, most of his articles speak in a tone of voice as if he were just telling you about this over a cup of coffee at his kitchen table. Highly recommendable (and also customizable – since all of his posts are listed here, you can just delve into whatever topic you have always wondered about without having to block out several hours from your schedule.)
To add yet another viewpoint, look at this recent article which is very critical of the scientific journalism surrounding GMOs and especially the eulogies surrounding their achievements which, it argues, often do not have replicable scientific evidence to back them up. It points out the huge responsibility science reporters have in influencing public opinion, and how much companies rely on them to portray one image or another:
The fundamental driver behind scientific misreporting, therefore, is not intellectually lazy journalists (though they do help). It is that for agribusinesses and other powerful corporations everything is at stake in science journalism. Their reputations as essential and ethical organisations are daily at risk for the reason that it is in science that the hypocrisy is most self-evident: of financing climate change denial while espousing corporate responsibility, of insisting on due process while buying ones way into the political process (or bribing government officials), of attempting to undermine environmental and worker safety legislation, while describing oneself as a clean green global good citizen, and so on.
It continues to contend:
But in this the biotech industry is no different from almost every realm of economic activity. From the food industry to the mining industry, to the conduct of wars, very few people would support these activities in anything like their present form if they were fully understood. It follows that the underlying reason businesses operate as they do is that the modern press fails in its fundamental purpose. In 1822 James Madison wrote that:
“A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy or perhaps both.”
In this last sentiment, I agree. There is no worse way of making a decision than letting yourself be drawn one way or another by simplistic news headlines. All the more reason to hunker down and read all those 26 installments by Johnson – for me, maybe tomorrow. 😉
You might find this interesting for a personal context of GMOs. It’s about two neighbouring farmers in WA one organic and the other GMO and they are in court right now because some GMO contaminated the neighbours farm. It’s an interesting read! 🙂
http://gmo-food.theglobalmail.org/steve-marsh-bad-seeds
I also haven’t read all of the Grist pieces, but one element niggles at me at the (seemingly growing) triumph narrative around the safety of GMOs. Ok, two elements.
(1) The retraction of the Seralini study considered, and the majority (though not 100%) of peer-reviewed studies finding no health effects doesn’t seem to address that many (not all) of the critiques of Seralini’s study could be leveled at many of the peer-reviewed studies “proving” safety, and very very little (to my knowledge) long-term epidemiology has been conducted (feeding through end-of-life/death by natural causes rather than methodological “sacrificing” of the animals). I could be wrong here, but I believe this is true based on what I’ve seen.
(2) The “same as conventional breeding” claim is spurious, because “conventional breeding” includes numerous different (disparate, even) practices with different levels of projected unknown risk (page 64 here: http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10977&page=64#p2000a7b39960064001). One form of what is typically considered genetic engineering (Agrobacterium transfer within closely related species) is classed at being similarly “dangerous” as the husbandry humans have been doing for ages. Of the four methods deemed most likely to present unintended effects, three are genetic engineering methods; only mutation breeding (radiogenically or chemogenically derived) is “higher” than those methods. So really, the safety of both “traditional” foods and GE foods are likely variable.
Several colleagues told me they distrusted this graphic, as the axis (“Less likely –> More Likely”) is not numerical and one is skeptical on how it was derived. But it seems to me this could only be done by asking experts to “guess”, as true numbers would require the kind of extensive testing and reporting regime that is not present — and ultimately, this is what worries me. I’m convinced that GE is not inherently more risky in all its forms, for human health. But this makes me worry about how much we may be missing–in our large, interconnected food system, something that would only affect 0.001% of the population could potentially sicken 3000 people. As far as I can tell, we have nothing like the system that would allow us to detect than level of health effects based on food variety changes (or most anything else in food for that matter) *unless they are acute*. If a conventionally bred cultivar will, for some reason, induce biological changes over decades in 3000 people, that’s not at all nothing, but we would never know.
To me, this all militates for being more cautious about all breeding (not to mention food additives), not less. There are almost certainly no acute health effects of GE food, at least, not as distinct from conventional techniques. There is probably a lot of “churn” of uncommon sub-acute effects for many, many Americans (something as yet determined seems to be increasing allergies and sensitivities), including some that are positive. Maybe it all evens out. It’s certainly not dropping us like flies. But let’s be humble in the face of a big “We don’t know, and can’t know for a long time”, alongside a “some forms of GE are almost certainly more ‘risky’ than others, and this militates for more careful testing all around, not less careful testing of GE.'”
And actually, to be clear, I’m more worried about the possibility of new varieties–GE or not–that could some day pop up that might have much higher rates of effects than .001%– 0.1% is several hundred thousand people in the US, sorry for the US-centric take. If these effects were gradual and subacute, we’d have very little way to detect them. I don’t trust industry to do the long-term close vigilance on this kind of unlikely-but-possible scenario, and I don’t trust them to tell us if they did (knowing as they do that something that affects a small percentage of people on a decadal time scale would probably not hurt their business at all).
That said, it’s not the highest worry. But it seems to me a scientifically valid one that belies easy assurances of our safe food system. Sandra Steingraber’s work on this has been excellent wrt agricultural (suspected) carcinogens. (http://www.livingdownstream.com/)