GMO’s: Scare Mongering at Its Worst! Part II

By Rich Kozlovich

Mike Adams, who publishes Natural News and styles himself as the Health Ranger recently posted an article entitled, The Agricultural Holocaust explained: the 10 worst ways GMOs threaten humanity and our natural world on July 27, 2014.

He claims "genetically modified organisms (GMOs) a serious threat to humanity and the environment? The reasons span the realms of science, social justice, economics and the environment, and once you understand this, you'll readily understand why so many environmentalists, humanitarians, responsible scientists and social justice advocates are strongly opposed to GMOs", and lists ten reasons why?

This will be a ten part series. Here is Part I.

His second claim is - GMOs have never been safety tested for human consumption, and goes on to say;

Although GMO advocates ridiculously claim GMOs have been "proven safe in thousands of studies," what they don't tell you is that those were all short-term studies on animals, not humans.

In fact, GMOs have never been shown to be safe for long-term human consumption. What happens when a child eats GMOs for two decades? Does it substantially increase their risk of cancer, diabetes, kidney failure or future Alzheimer's? Nobody knows, exactly, because the tests haven't been done.

As often happens with other chemicals, GMOs are simply let loose into the world with an attitude of "let's see what happens!"

Although I’ve largely addressed this in my previous post, I will add this. Nothing can be proven safe; it’s called proving a negative. Scientifically impossible! You can only prove what things do, not what they don’t do. It’s like demanding someone “prove” they’re “not” cheating on their spouse. Can’t be done! And these people know this, making it another lie of omission. Since these products have been used for decades, and there’s no indication that GMO’s cause anything, including “cancer, diabetes, kidney failure or future Alzheimer's” why does he say it? Because speculation is easy! He might just as well make the claim – “we don’t know if GMO’s causes AIDS!”

You can make any accusation and frame it in the form of a question and not have to prove anything one way or another. But the thought is planted in people’s minds there’s something nefarious about GMO’s, and the companies producing them. This has been the scare tactic activists have been using going back to Silent Spring and the mother of junk science, Rachel Carson.

Dr. Madeleine Pelner Cosman, Ph.D. notes that there are seven steps to this process and usually follow this pattern:

1.      Create a "scientific" study that predicts a public health disaster

2.      Release the study to the media, before scientists can review it

3.      Generate an intense emotional public reaction

4.      Develop a government-enforced solution

5.      Intimidate Congress into passing it into law

6.      Coerce manufacturers to stop making the product

7.      Bully users to replace it, or obliterate it

One more thing that needs to be addressed and that’s exactly what pesticide is he talking about? Since GMO Bt cotton is his theme later in his article, we need to see what the EPA thinks:

Bt products are found to be safe for use in the environment and with mammals. The EPA (environmental protection agency) has not found any human health hazards related to using Bt. In fact the EPA has found Bt safe enough that it has exempted Bt from food residue tolerances, groundwater restrictions, endangered species labeling and special review requirements. Bt is often used near lakes, rivers and dwellings, and has no known effect on wildlife such as mammals, birds, and fish.

Humans exposed orally to 1000 mg/day for 3-5 days of Bthave showed no ill effects. Many tests have been conducted on test animals using different types of exposures. The results of the tests showed that the use of Bt causes few if any negative effects. Bt does not persist in the digestive systems of mammals.

Bt is found to be an eye irritant on test rabbits. There is very slight irritation from inhalation in test animals which may be caused by the physical rather than the biological properties of the Bt formulation tested.

Bt has not been shown to have any chronic toxicity or any carcinogenic effects. There are also no indication that Bt causes reproductive effects or birth defects in mammals.

Bt breaks down readily in the environment. Because of this Bt poses no threat to groundwater. Bt also breaks down under the ultraviolet (UV) light of the sun.

We have to get past this outrageous scare mongering and realize they're big argument is that GMO's are "unnatural" because of how the genes are implanted. That's completely the wrong take. Our only concern should be what the genes are supposed to do, not how they got there. Part III will follow. 

 

Here are the links to the entire series:   Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI,Part VII, Part VIII, Part IX and Part X