[.ca] Genetic Roulette: The Documented Health Risks of ... (ISBN 0972966528)

The case against Genetically Engineered food:
Read this book, or even just the introduction, and you are unlikely to want to eat any genetically modified (GM) food again. The known dangers and observed effects are first described. Then is outlined the fact that there is no competent mechanism in place to protect people from these dangers. Government regulations are not sufficient to identify most of the health issues, and industry safety studies, relied upon by governments, are rigged to avoid finding problems. The standard picture that some would have you believe is that taking a gene from one organism and placing it in another is like taking a page out of one book and placing it in an appropriate place in another book. Take a gene that produces a flashing green light in one organism and add it in the right place to the DNA of another organism and presto it now produces a flashing green light. This pretty picture could hardly be more misleading. This is not what is done, and the result is not what this simple picture would have one expect.. Firstly, the transfer of a gene from one organism to another is accomplished in shotgun fashion. There is little control over where the gene ends up, the gene may be damaged in the process, and the genes of the receiving DNA may be damaged. The result can be a shambles, with bits of DNA where they do not belong, duplicated and so on. The altered DNA can produce proteins which may be toxic. Actually, the idea that a gene is a particular isolated well-defined sequence of DNA is not correct. You would think that the companies involved would at least sequence the new DNA they make. If they do, they dont supply the information to the regulators and do their best to prevent researchers from doing the sequencing. When researchers do it they find a mess. They also find that the DNA is unstable and changes in time. Secondly, the insertion of some new sequence into the DNA of an organism has unpredictable consequences since what a piece of DNA does depends on other parts of the DNA. A holistic understanding is needed, and that simply does not exist. It is not surprising then that genetically modified crops have produced sterile pigs, dead cows and sheep, a mysterious disease in people in the Philippines, high offspring mortality among rats and allergic reactions among cotton workers. These and numerous other examples are described in the book. Rates of food allergy among children have skyrocketed and it is likely due to GM food, but that cannot be proved because GM food is not identified in the USA. When GM soy was introduced in the UK, soy allergies jumped 50%. In general, if there are problems with GM food we will probably never know because the cause will not be traceable and many diseases take a very long time to develop. GM foods that have been approved have not been properly tested. In fact the companies hardly do any fundamental testing. The companies seem to have adopted a dont look, dont find strategy. When there is an association of GM food with animals or people becoming sick or dying, no proper investigation done. The phrase substantial equivalence is used by regulators; it sounds good; it is scientific nonsense - there is no such thing. Much of our food has been genetically modified and we dont know it. How do we know what effects it is having on us? We have no way of determining it. It was very difficult to determine that tobacco smoking causes cancer even though it was known who smoked and who didnt. Had we not known that it is unlikely that we would know even now that smoking caused cancer. There is no way to know now who is eating what genetically modified food, and we will not be able to determine the effects of it on human health. There are people around who are seriously debilitated and the medical establishment doesnt know why. Is it because of some GM food they ate? We desperately need legislation that requires labeling of genetically modified food. Why do the food companies oppose labeling so strongly? What are they afraid of? This book is wonderfully organized. You can read a very short summary of each section, a longer summary, or the whole section, depending on your preference and level of scientific understanding.