Genetically Engineered Foods May Cause Rising Food Allergies

[nosmokes]

original-responsible technology

This spilling the beans issue is being released during Food Allergy Awareness Week, and is part of our special series on Food Safety and Genetically Engineered Foods.

Genetically Engineered Foods May Cause Rising Food Allergies

Part 1: Genetically Engineered Soybeans

The huge jump in childhood food allergies in the US is in the news often<1>, but most reports fail to consider a link to a recent radical change in America’s diet. Beginning in 1996, bacteria, virus and other genes have been artificially inserted to the DNA of soy, corn, cottonseed and canola plants. These unlabeled genetically modified (GM) foods carry a risk of triggering life-threatening allergic reactions, and evidence collected over the past decade now suggests that they are contributing to higher allergy rates.

Food safety tests are inadequate to protect public health

Scientists have long known that GM crops might cause allergies. But there are no tests to prove in advance that a GM crop is safe.<2> That’s because people aren’t usually allergic to a food until they have eaten it several times. “The only definitive test for allergies,” according to former FDA microbiologist Louis Pribyl, “is human consumption by affected peoples, which can have ethical considerations.”<3> And it is the ethical considerations of feeding unlabeled, high-risk GM crops to unknowing consumers that has many people up in arms.

The UK is one of the few countries that conducts a yearly evaluation of food allergies. In March 1999, researchers at the York Laboratory were alarmed to discover that reactions to soy had skyrocketed by 50% over the previous year. Genetically modified soy had recently entered the UK from US imports and the soy used in the study was largely GM. John Graham, spokesman for the York laboratory, said, “We believe this raises serious new questions about the safety of GM foods.”<4>

Critics of GM foods often say that the US population is being used as guinea pigs in an experiment. But experiments have the benefit of controls and measurement. In this case, there is neither. GM food safety experts point out that even if a someone tried to collect data about allergic reactions to GM foods, they would not likely be successful. “The potential allergen is rarely identified. The number of allergy-related medical visits is not tabulated. Even repeated visits due to well-known allergens are not counted as part of any established surveillance system.”<5> Indeed, after the Canadian government announced in 2002 that they would “keep a careful eye on the health of Canadians”<6> to see if GM foods had any adverse reactions, they abandoned their plans within a year, saying that such a study was too difficult.
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complete article here

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

1. Reading Really Flawed Studies MAY Make Your Hair Fall Out And Cause Cancer.

Then again, it may not.

[ThomCat]

2. Of course, on this subject you're so knee-jerk certain

that you'd fault any study without ever bothering to read it. :eyes:

It must be nice to be so magically certain you're always right even you're just being dogmatic. :eyes:

[nosmokes]

3. New England Journal of Medicine - what a bunch of shysters!

then again, maybe not. if you can cite something that refutes this then go ahead. me, i don't appreciate being used as a guinea pig for low down multi-nat corporations that are patenting life forms and basically enslaving people all in pursuit of the almighty holy dollar and i'm baffled by supposed liberals that side with the likes of monsanto and syngento and bayer while they go about raping and poisoning mother earth and it's inhabitants. but that's just me.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

4. First You Kindly Refute That Reading Flawed Studies Doesn't Make Your Hair Fall Out And Cause Cancer

Cause it may ya know. Or it may not. Please feel free to refute that.

[nosmokes]

5. yeah, i didn't think so. n/t

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

6. Didn't Think You Could Either. Pretty Tough To Refute May Or May Not Arguments Ain't It Pal?

Maybe now you'll grasp the point.

[nosmokes]

7. you're the one insinuating the studies cited are *flawed.*

can you back that up or didja simply pull that outta your ass? because the studies cited seem to me to come from pretty reliable sources and the only thing you have supplied is asinine comments. so i challenge you again - if you can seriously cite anything that would indicate the studies cited in the article as flawed then do so. otherwise you're simply showing yourself to be a little dick.