Anti-, problems with, etc GMO foods

rambler · #61 03/05/13, 11:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by primal1

Actually, I heard a scientist saying that 15 years is barely enough time see potential problems, especially not knowing what we're looking for.

I understand what you are saying.

It would seem that Roundup itself has been on the market since the 1970s, has been tested a lot, and appears by all tests to be safer than other herbicides?

The early versions of roundup ready and bt gmo grains tended to put most of the gmo material in the roots and stems, not in the grain itself. It was targeted, and still mostly is.

Then most of the grains are used to feed livestock, so the direct contact with humans has been pretty low until the last 5 years or so.

Despite what one reads, there have been lots of tests of various combinations of these products. Some of the most tested products out there. After all, many back to earth folks like Paul Mitchell products, and the extent of his testing is to try it on his family.... Gmo products are tested oh up just a bit more over the past 25 years.

But still, I do see your point. We don't know. In another 25 years, we still won't know. We don't know if cell phones cause brain damage. No one can, or ever will, be able to say a gmo product is 100% safe for everyone always.

There are a lot of questions in this world, more questions than answers.

Paul

Bearfootfarm · #62 03/06/13, 12:29 AM

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France 09/2012 study, doesn't exactly paint the Monsanto picture either.
Though some have criticized the study but it has yet to be dismissed

Actually it was dismissed totally by more than one agency:

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The EU’s food safety agency definitively rejected Wednesday a bombshell French report linking genetically modified corn to cancer, saying it failed to meet “acceptable scientific standards.”

“Serious defects in the design and methodology of a paper by Seralini et al. mean it does not meet acceptable scientific standards,” the European Food Safety Authority said in a statement.

“Consequently it is not possible to draw valid conclusions about the occurrence of tumours in the rats tested,” the agency said.

EFSA, which reviews the use and authorisation of GMOs (Genetically Modified Organisms), added that it “finds there is no need to re-examine its previous safety evaluations of NK603,” the genetically modified maize developed by US agribusiness giant Monsanto.

That same conclusion had been reached in separate and independent assessments of Gilles-Eric Seralini’s work carried out in six European Union nations, the agency added.

http://www.euronews.com/2012/09/20/f...gm-food-study/

Quote:

Currently, 46 varieties of GM products are allowed in the EU. They include corn, cotton and canola oil varieties and one type of potato and beetroot.

He used a strain of rats who are so inbred that 40-80% of them develop tumors as adults anyway

primal1 · #63 03/06/13, 08:01 AM

My apologies! None of that came up when i was reading about it, I even read a paper saying it was submitted to Health Canada for review. And i was not only looking at Anti-GMO papers/sites honest!

primal1 · #64 03/06/13, 08:30 AM

I will look into it more later but at the moment, it still raises more questions than it answers.. why has it been dismissed, even if they used rats prone to tumors they had a control group which showed markedly less instances.. you have to admit the numbers are quite substantially different, provided the same rats were used in both groups, which isn't clear.

Bearfootfarm · #65 03/06/13, 03:14 PM

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you have to admit the numbers are quite substantially different,

The results reported simply aren't trustworthy due to the reputation and methods of Seralini.
Six countries did independent reviews, and they all came to that same conclusion

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why has it been dismissed

Wasn't that already answered in the post above?

primal1 · #66 03/06/13, 04:38 PM

Searching for the authors response to review being dismissed uncovered a lot. Yes it was dismissed but it was also the first stage of the review.. i guess we'll have to wait!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...m-maize-cancer
Here are the criticisms in a nutshell and Séralini's responses:

1. The French researchers were accused of using the Sprague Dawley rat strain which is said to be prone to developing cancers. In response Séralini and his team say these are the same rats as used by Monsanto in the 90-day trials which it used to get authorisation for its maize. This strain of rat has been used in most animal feeding trials to evaluate the safety of GM foods, and their results have long been used by the biotech industry to secure approval to market GM products.

2. The sample size of rats was said to be too small. Séralini responded that six is the OECD recommended protocol for GM food safety toxicology studies and he had based his study on the toxicity part of OECD protocol no. 453. This states that for a cancer trial you need a minimum of 50 animals of each sex per test group but for a toxicity trial a minimum of 10 per sex suffices. Monsanto used 20 rats of each sex per group in its feeding trials but only analysed 10, the same number as Séralini.

3. No data was given about the rats' food intake. Seralini says the rats were allowed to eat as much food as they liked.

4. Séralini has not released the raw data from the trial. In response he says he won't release it until the data underpinning Monsanto's authorisation of NK603 in Europe is also made public.

5. His funding was provided by an anti-biotechnology organisation whose scientific board Séralini heads. But he counters that almost all GM research is funded by corporates or by pro-biotech institutions.

primal1 · #67 03/06/13, 05:14 PM

I just want to add that I work for a University Professor that heads 2 departments at McGill, he has always been a professor(now 73 years old) and publishes countless papers, books, articles and speaks publicly around the world.. his reputation is his livelihood so I do find it hard to believe(though not impossible), that others in his shoes would risk so much against industry giants.

This is the author of the study.. Pr Gilles Eric Séralini – President of the Scientific Board – Molecular Biology Professor
http://www.criigen.org/SiteEn/index....=57&Itemid=105

PrettyPaisley · #68 03/06/13, 10:40 PM

Primal-your research is to be commended but you will *never* satisfy the pro-GMO folks here.

Bearfootfarm · #69 03/07/13, 12:25 AM

Quote:

you will *never* satisfy the pro-GMO folks here

Not by posting the same old studies that have been refuted before, while showing nothing that proves GMO's are harmful

Kstornado11 · #70 03/07/13, 12:33 AM

The VERY simple, obvious way to resolve the whole GMO problem is to just LABEL the foods that are marketed, & let THE PEOPLE decide. Seems simple enough... we have the RIGHT to know exactly what we are buying, ingesting, feeding to our children.

What's the problem with that?

Paquebot · #71 03/07/13, 12:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kstornado11

The VERY simple, obvious way to resolve the whole GMO problem is to just LABEL the foods that are marketed, & let THE PEOPLE decide. Seems simple enough... we have the RIGHT to know exactly what we are buying, ingesting, feeding to our children.

What's the problem with that?

The people HAVE decided. The few times when it has become a public issue has been a failure. The people who must buy their food are not stupid. They vote with their wallets. They see the cost of conventional food as compared to organic and don't want a third level. Especially so when there is already no nutritional value difference in the two that currently exist. Saw one post elsewhere the other day about the whole vaccination and GMO process being designed to depopulate the world. Didn't feel up to informing him that if that's the purpose, it ain't working!

Martin

Kstornado11 · #72 03/07/13, 01:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paquebot

The people HAVE decided. The few times when it has become a public issue has been a failure. The people who must buy their food are not stupid. They vote with their wallets. They see the cost of conventional food as compared to organic and don't want a third level. Especially so when there is already no nutritional value difference in the two that currently exist. Saw one post elsewhere the other day about the whole vaccination and GMO process being designed to depopulate the world. Didn't feel up to informing him that if that's the purpose, it ain't working!

Martin

I am confused... I just don't believe that if everyone were totally informed of all the particulars of GMO foods that they would choose to NOT be informed. The majority have NO idea of what it involves, the general public really is NOT informed about where their food comes from, nor what is in it. I think that most people need & want to be informed & educated, & more involved in what they are eating. There is a HUGE movement to grow your own food now, & I think that is wonderful!!

We all have the right to know exactly what we are eating... that doesn't seem to be too difficult or controversial to me. I am looking for healthier alternatives for my family, such as antibiotic-free grass-fed beef & chicken as opposed to factory farmed, trying to grow as much as my own veggies as possible, avoiding as much processed foods as I possibly can. My kids really do respond to healthier eating, & I feel much better too!! I really am excited about the new movement of small family farms who avoid pesticides & GMOs, & where the animals aren't tortured & treated horribly. That is what this forum has taught me over all these years; The right way to farm by people who really CARE about nature, people,animals & the world!!

Bearfootfarm · #73 03/07/13, 01:28 AM

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Séralini has not released the raw data from the trial.

Then nothing he says matters, since he won't show his proof

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His funding was provided by an anti-biotechnology organisation

One more reason to only believe what he can prove, which so far has been nothing at all

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i guess we'll have to wait!

No need to wait, since the answers have been around for quite a while:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/...ef=online-news

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Five of the 20 control rats – 25 per cent – got tumours and died, while 60 per cent in "some test groups" that ate GM maize died.

Some other test groups, however, were healthier than the controls.

Toxicologists do a standard mathematical test, called the standard deviation, on such data to see whether the difference is what you might expect from random variation, or can be considered significant.

The French team did not present these tests in their paper. They used a complicated and unconventional analysis that Sanders calls "a statistical fishing trip".
Anthony Trewavas of the University of Edinburgh, UK, adds that in any case, there should be at least as many controls as test rats – there were only 20 of the former and 80 of the latter – to show how variably tumours appear.

Without those additional controls, "these results are of no value", he says.

"They show that old rats get tumours and die," says Mark Tester of the University of Adelaide, Australia. "That is all that can be concluded."

Paquebot · #74 03/07/13, 01:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kstornado11

I am confused... I just don't believe that if everyone were totally informed of all the particulars of GMO foods that they would choose to NOT be informed. The majority have NO idea of what it involves, the general public really is NOT informed about where their food comes from, nor what is in it. I think that most people need & want to be informed & educated, & more involved in what they are eating.

And there is the biggest mistake that a few people on HT are making. They claim that everyone except them are the only ones who can decide what the American consumers want to buy. They are not ignorant morons whose sole purpose in life is to eat and proliferate. In fact, they are more apt to be totally informed about what they eat than many who produce it since they are more apt to have access to that information via the Internet. Claiming otherwise is a slap on any non-rural member of this forum and that includes me. My wife has worked in the same supermarket chain for over 35 years and yet I do most of the grocery shopping in another chain. Saying that we don't know what the American consumer wants is worse than trying to force us into accepting something that we do not want or need. If you are a food producer, the American consumer is paying your bills. It's not wise to bite the hand that feeds you.

Martin

Kstornado11 · #75 03/07/13, 01:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paquebot

And there is the biggest mistake that a few people on HT are making. They claim that everyone except them are the only ones who can decide what the American consumers want to buy. They are not ignorant morons whose sole purpose in life is to eat and proliferate. In fact, they are more apt to be totally informed about what they eat than many who produce it since they are more apt to have access to that information via the Internet. Claiming otherwise is a slap on any non-rural member of this forum and that includes me. My wife has worked in the same supermarket chain for over 35 years and yet I do most of the grocery shopping in another chain. Saying that we don't know what the American consumer wants is worse than trying to force us into accepting something that we do not want or need. If you are a food producer, the American consumer is paying your bills. It's not wise to bite the hand that feeds you.

Martin

All I am saying is to let American consumers be totally aware of what they are buying/consuming. Not too difficult... We deserve the right to know exactly what is in our food. If that is a problem, well..........
Seems simple enough to me...?

Paquebot · #76 03/07/13, 02:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kstornado11

All I am saying is to let American consumers be totally aware of what they are buying/consuming. Not too difficult... We deserve the right to know exactly what is in our food. If that is a problem, well..........
Seems simple enough to me...?

The American consumers have long been aware of what they are consuming and have spoken as to what they want. They don't need any labels or a third level of pricing. Every supermarket manager knows what to stock for organic foods and what doesn't sell. Organic certification currently calls for no GMO, as I understand. If the consumer only wants non-GMO organic food, then he or she has options to buy just from a store which specializes in such food. There doesn't need to be a special factory built in Kansas just to accommodate a tiny percentage of consumers why may want another option in New York City. Adding an organic option to every single item in a store is what some Luddites want. For one, can you imagine every single brand of breakfast cereal being available in both conventional and organic? And if the organic cereal were processed in the same factory as the conventional cereal, there would have to be the same warning as given on non-peanut products prepared in a facility which processes peanuts. Unless both products were identical in cost, a factor which does not hold true for growing it, the organic version would never leave the store shelf.

Supplying food to an urban populace has its roots thousands of years ago when Man got tired of walking all day to find food and decided to grow it instead. His excess was traded with another of the clan who may have settled on a different trade. System has worked non-stop ever since and thus saying that the comsumers and processors are ignorant of what each other wants just doesn't hold water. That system ain't broke and thus doesn't need fixing.

Martin

Kstornado11 · #77 03/07/13, 02:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paquebot

The American consumers have long been aware of what they are consuming and have spoken as to what they want. They don't need any labels or a third level of pricing. Every supermarket manager knows what to stock for organic foods and what doesn't sell. Organic certification currently calls for no GMO, as I understand. If the consumer only wants non-GMO organic food, then he or she has options to buy just from a store which specializes in such food. There doesn't need to be a special factory built in Kansas just to accommodate a tiny percentage of consumers why may want another option in New York City. Adding an organic option to every single item in a store is what some Luddites want. For one, can you imagine every single brand of breakfast cereal being available in both conventional and organic? And if the organic cereal were processed in the same factory as the conventional cereal, there would have to be the same warning as given on non-peanut products prepared in a facility which processes peanuts. Unless both products were identical in cost, a factor which does not hold true for growing it, the organic version would never leave the store shelf.

Supplying food to an urban populace has its roots thousands of years ago when Man got tired of walking all day to find food and decided to grow it instead. His excess was traded with another of the clan who may have settled on a different trade. System has worked non-stop ever since and thus saying that the comsumers and processors are ignorant of what each other wants just doesn't hold water. That system ain't broke and thus doesn't need fixing.

Martin

When I go to the store/Farmer's Market, private farm,etc, I want to know EXACTLY what I am buying. What is the problem with that? I think ALL food should be labeled as what it IS...
It is as simple as that!!!

LABEL FOOD = VERY SIMPLE!!!!

arabian knight · #78 03/07/13, 04:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paquebot

The American consumers have long been aware of what they are consuming and have spoken as to what they want. They don't need any labels or a third level of pricing. Every supermarket manager knows what to stock for organic foods and what doesn't sell. Organic certification currently calls for no GMO, as I understand. If the consumer only wants non-GMO organic food, then he or she has options to buy just from a store which specializes in such food. There doesn't need to be a special factory built in Kansas just to accommodate a tiny percentage of consumers why may want another option in New York City. Adding an organic option to every single item in a store is what some Luddites want. For one, can you imagine every single brand of breakfast cereal being available in both conventional and organic? And if the organic cereal were processed in the same factory as the conventional cereal, there would have to be the same warning as given on non-peanut products prepared in a facility which processes peanuts. Unless both products were identical in cost, a factor which does not hold true for growing it, the organic version would never leave the store shelf.

Supplying food to an urban populace has its roots thousands of years ago when Man got tired of walking all day to find food and decided to grow it instead. His excess was traded with another of the clan who may have settled on a different trade. System has worked non-stop ever since and thus saying that the comsumers and processors are ignorant of what each other wants just doesn't hold water. That system ain't broke and thus doesn't need fixing.

Martin

So very true.
Some want labels well fine Buy Organic simple as that. and leave the rest lone as the price would go so high it would hurt everyone concerned up and down the chain. It ins't just a simple thing to just Slap a Label on it. Everything up and down the supply line also has to be guaranteed to make ANY labeling program work. And that adds so much cost the Public just have not wanted in the past and will not want it into the future.
People have voted with their wallets and they want it just Left Along. Why should just a so very small and I MEAN a very small percentage tell the rest of the country how and want they should have, when they don't want change in the first place. Period.

Bearfootfarm · #79 03/07/13, 04:49 AM

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I think ALL food should be labeled as what it IS...

It is ....if it's corn, it says "corn", etc

If it's a processed food that has corn, you already KNOW it's GMO unless it says "all organic"

The fact is most people really don't care, since there are no proven harmful effects from GMO's

rambler · #80 03/07/13, 05:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kstornado11

When I go to the store/Farmer's Market, private farm,etc, I want to know EXACTLY what I am buying. What is the problem with that? I think ALL food should be labeled as what it IS...
It is as simple as that!!!

LABEL FOOD = VERY SIMPLE!!!!

Food already is labeled.

Processed food has a list of ingredients.

Organic producers have strict rules to follow to use certain labels.

Private orginizations have their own seal of approval, with their own labels.

Many small homesteader type producers struggle with the requirements to label and keep up with the paperwork required now.

What more labels do you want, and to what end?

We already have labels, look at the food you buy????

Makes no sense to me. A couple of you on here ask for labels, when we are covered in labels already. You already have the many choices you ask for. I don't understand, what more you want?

It seems simple to you, but I can't understand what more it is you want?

Paul