Gene Altered Foods: A Case Against Panic  

JANE E. BRODY / New York Times 5dec00

Commentary by Mindfully.org below

Agricultural scientists can take the genes responsible for a desired trait from any organism and introduce it into a given crop. One Method - Researchers place the desired genes into a bacterium that naturally alters a plant's DNA, then infect the plant. The bacterium inserts the new genetic codes into the plant's DNA./ The cells are then grown to maturity, producing future generations with the desired characteristic. Note from Mindfully.org - not mentioned is the fact that scientists do not and can not know what other characteristics might be expressed by any genetic implantation, using any method to insert it. In other words, genetic engineering is extremely inaccurate using any measurement except Industry's.

Ask American consumers whether they support the use of biotechnology in food and agriculture and nearly 70 percent say they do. But ask the question another way, "Do you approve of genetically engineered (or genetically modified) foods?" and two- thirds say they do not.

Yet there is no difference between them. The techniques involved and the products that result are identical. Rather, the words "genetic" and "engineer" seem to provoke alarm among millions of consumers.

The situation recalls the introduction of the M.R.I. (for magnetic resonance imaging), which was originally called an N.M.R., for nuclear magnetic resonance. The word nuclear, which in this case referred only to the nucleus of an atom, caused such public concern, it threatened to stymie the growth of this valuable medical tool.

The idea of genetically modified foods, known as GM foods, is particularly frightening to those who know little about how foods are now produced and how modern genetic technology, if properly regulated, could result in significant improvements by reducing environmental hazards, improving the nutritional value of foods, enhancing agricultural productivity and fostering the survival worldwide of small farms and the rural landscape.

Without GM foods, Dr. Alan McHughen, a biotechnologist at the University of Saskatchewan, told a recent conference on agricultural biotechnology at Cornell, the earth will not be able to feed the ever-growing billions of people who inhabit it.

Still, there are good reasons for concern about a powerful technology that is currently imperfectly regulated and could, if inadequately tested or misapplied, bring on both nutritional and environmental havoc. To render a rational opinion on the subject and make reasoned choices in the marketplace, it is essential to understand what genetic engineering of foods and crops involves and its potential benefits and risks.

Genetics in Agriculture

People have been genetically modifying foods and crops for tens of thousands of years.¹ The most commonly used method has involved crossing two parents with different desirable characteristics in an effort to produce offspring that express the best of both of them. That and another approach, inducing mutations, are time-consuming and hit-or-miss and can result in good and bad characteristics.

Genetic engineering, on the other hand, involves the introduction into a plant or animal or micro-organism of a single gene or group of genes that are known quantities², genes that dictate the production of one or more desired elements, for example, the ability to resist the attack of insects, withstand herbicide treatments or produce foods with higher levels of essential nutrients.

Since all organisms use the same genetic material (DNA), the power of the technique includes the ability to transfer genes between organisms that normally would never interbreed.³

Thus, an antifreeze gene from Arctic flounder has been introduced into strawberries to extend their growing season in northern climates. But contrary to what many people think, this does not make the strawberries "fishy" any more than the use of porcine insulin turned people into pigs.

Dr. Steven Kresovich, a plant breeder at Cornell, said, "Genes should be characterized by function, not origin.  It's not a flounder gene but a cold tolerance gene that was introduced into strawberries." ⁴

As Dr. McHughen points out in his new book, "Pandora's Picnic Basket: The Potential and Hazards of Genetically Modified Foods" (Oxford, $25), people share about 7,000 genes with a worm called C. elegans. The main difference between organisms lies in the total number of genes their cells contain, how the genes are arranged and which ones are turned on or off in different cells at different times.

Current and Potential Benefits

An insecticidal toxin from a bacterium called Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) has been genetically introduced into two major field crops, corn and cotton, resulting in increased productivity and decreased use of pesticides, which means less environmental contamination and greater profits for farmers. For example, by growing Bt cotton, farmers could reduce spraying for bollworm and budworm from seven times a season to none. Bt corn also contains much lower levels of fungal toxins, which are potentially carcinogenic.

The genetic introduction of herbicide tolerance into soybeans is saving farmers about $200 million a year by reducing the number of applications of herbicide needed to control weed growth, said Leonard Gianessi, a pesticide analyst at the National Center for Food and Agricultural Policy, a research organization in Washington.

Genetically engineered pharmaceuticals are already widely used, with more than 150 products on the market. Since 1978, genetically modified bacteria have been producing human insulin, which is used by 3.3 million people with diabetes.

Future food benefits are likely to accrue directly to the consumer. For example, genetic engineers have developed golden rice, a yellow rice rich in beta carotene (which the body converts to vitamin A) and iron.

If farmers in developing countries accept this crop and if the millions of people who suffer from nutrient deficiencies will eat it, golden rice could prevent widespread anemia and blindness in half a million children a year and the deaths of one million to two million children who succumb each year to the consequences of vitamin A deficiency.

Future possibilities include peanuts or shrimp lacking proteins that can cause life- threatening food allergies, fruits and vegetables with longer shelf lives, foods with fewer toxicants and antinutrients, meat and dairy products and oils with heart-healthier fats and foods that deliver vaccines.

Real and Potential Risks

GM foods and crops arrived without adequate mechanisms in place to regulate them. Three agencies are responsible for monitoring their safety for consumers, farmers and the environment: the Food and Drug Administration, the Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Protection Agency. But the drug agency says its law does not allow it to require premarket testing of GM foods unless they contain a new substance that is not "generally recognized as safe."

For most products, safety tests are done voluntarily by producers. The recent recall of taco shells containing GM corn that had not been approved for human consumption was done voluntarily by the producer. The agency is now formulating new guidelines to test GM products and to label foods as "GM-free" but says it lacks a legal basis to require labeling of GM foods.

"In the current environment, such a label would be almost a kiss of death on a product," said Dr. Michael Jacobson, director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a nonprofit consumer group. "But it may be that the public is simply not going to have confidence in transgenic ingredients if their presence is kept secret."

The introduction of possible food allergens through genetic engineering is a major concern. If the most common sources of food allergens — peanuts, shellfish, celery, nuts, milk or eggs — had to pass through an approval process today, they would never make it to market.

But consumers could be taken unaware if an otherwise safe food was genetically endowed with an allergen, as almost happened with an allergenic protein from Brazil nuts. Even if known allergenic proteins are avoided in GM foods, it is hard to predict allergenicity of new proteins.

A potentially serious environmental risk involves the "escape" of GM genes from crops into the environment, where they may harm innocent organisms or contaminate crops that are meant to be GM-free.

Dr. Jacobson concluded, "Now is the time, while agricultural biotechnology is still young, for Congress and regulatory agencies to create the framework that will maximize the safe use of these products, bolster public confidence in them and allow all of humankind to benefit from their enormous potential." Two Congressional bills now under discussion can do much to assure safer use of agricultural biotechnology, he said.

Letters: When Food Is Modified

Letters to the Editor / New York Times 12dec00

To the Editor:

The column "Gene Altered Foods: A Case Against Panic" (Dec. 5) tried to make the case that unease about medical and agricultural uses of technology is often due to inaccurate terminology and poor understanding of science.

Unfortunately, it adds to the confusion by mischaracterizing the nature and role of genes. A plant breeder is quoted on the introduction of a gene from the Arctic flounder into strawberries and cites his interpretation: it is "not a flounder gene but a cold tolerance gene."

But there is no such thing as a cold tolerance gene independent of the organism in which it acts. Biologists agree that genes are context- dependent and may do different things in different cells and tissues of the same organism, not to mention in organisms as different as flounders and strawberries.

I suggest that inaccuracies in scientific terminology and concepts are often due to promoters of new technologies.

DR. STUART A. NEWMAN
Valhalla, N.Y.
The writer is a professor at New York Medical College.

To the Editor:

The Personal Health column on genetically modified foods promotes the misconceptions it warns of. The portrayal of current genetic "engineering" as precise and well defined is inappropriate today.

Few genes are "known quantities" and the process of introducing a foreign gene into an organism produces uncertainty about both the gene's function and the function of the DNA into which it is inserted.

Genetic engineering techniques are abysmally primitive, akin to swapping random parts between random cars to produce a better car. Yet our ignorance will fade; biological engineering will become a reality relatively soon.

But it is difficult to discuss this impending development when the public believes that the details are already understood, especially when mistakes are so publicly discussed. The conflation of "engineering" and such failures can only suggest a subtext that the problem is beyond hope and that further work will produce dire consequences.   

ROB CARLSON
Berkeley, Calif.
The writer is a research fellow at the Molecular Sciences Institute.

To the Editor:

The Personal Health column on Dec. 5 correctly notes the potential of genetically improved food to help feed the world and reduce the need for pesticides. But many are needlessly concerned about negligible risks posed by this technology. Genetically engineered food is thoroughly regulated by at least three federal agencies.

Superstition and fear should not interfere with this technology, which has so much to offer those who suffer from hunger and malnutrition. Unfounded concerns about hypothetical risks are far outweighed by the real benefits that will soon be realized, if scientific research and development of genetically modified agriculture is allowed to proceed unhindered.

DR. GILBERT ROSS
New York
The writer is the medical director of the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH), a group financed by foundations, trade associations, companies and individuals. (see notes below)

Further note on ACSH - It spends most of its time debunking many scientific facts that would have a negative financial effect upon an industry amongst is long list of corporate benefactors. 

Mindfully.org Notes:

1. It would be very convenient to find in a history book that the ancient Egyptians or Neanderthal practiced genetic engineering
2. There is no scientist or computer that can presently even calculate the numbers of interconnections that genes have with all that surrounds them, including the DNA, cell, organs, body, other organisms, air, humidity, light, and so forth. And if the day comes when they can calculate the numbers of interconnections they will still not know what they do. It is extremely naive (and dangerous if they actually believe the hype) for genetic engineers to proclaim that they "know what they are doing, and that it is 100% safe." 
3. This is one of the key issues in why GM crops are NOT the same as traditionally bred crops. A Flounder and a Tomato would NEVER interbreed. 
4. As an extension of corporate GM reductionist science, this is yet another of industry's latest attempts to misinform consumers. It is intended to draw attention away from the reality that genes originate within the organism. An example is human procreation. When a gene, carried in the sperm of one human enters the egg of another, the ensuing new life is truly made up of a combination of the parents' genes. So, when a fish is genetically engineered into a tomato, the new organism is both part tomato and part fish. Call it a Floumato !

Multinational corporate control of the world's food supply is proceeding quite rapidly. While it may not be apparent or phase the average US consumer, the Monsantos and Novartises of the world have purchased many seed companies and are still working on Terminator Technology, the GM technology that produces sterile crops, thus making the future farmers of the world hostages on their own soil. The majority of people around the world are still following ancient traditional breeding methods, saving and sharing seeds, and counting on a free exchange of genetic material. In the world of the multinational corporation, genes are patented, legally owned by whoever patents it first. In other words, life is now owned and profited with by its manipulation and misuse.

source: http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/05/science/05BROD.html 10 Oct 2006