Overview of Nat'l Academy of Sciences Whitewash on Health Hazards of GE Foods

News Update From The Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Foods
<www.thecampaign.org>
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Dear News Update Subscribers,

A major new report from the National Academy of Sciences was released this
week titled "Safety of Genetically Engineered Foods: Approaches to Assessing
Unintended Health Effects."

This project was funded by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the U.S.
Department of Agriculture (USDA), and the Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA).

The Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council are the
divisions of the National Academy of Sciences that released the report. The
report was conducted by the "Committee on Identifying and Assessing
Unintended Effects of Genetically Engineered Foods on Human Health."

This report from the nation's leading scientific organization raises many
red flags about the safety of genetically engineered foods. We will definitely
be using this important report in making our case to Congress about the need
to label genetically engineered foods.

You can read and/or purchase the entire 254-page report online at the
National Academies Press web site. There is also a 16-page executive
summary. Here is a link to the web site:
http://books.nap.edu/catalog/10977.html

Posted below are three articles about the report. However, before reading
the articles below, please allow me to point out a few things to keep in
mind:

1) Most of the people who served on this committee are very pro-biotech.
Many earn their livings in this field and stand to profit significantly if
this technology is adopted on a larger scale.

2) This type of safety review should have been conducted in the early
1990's, before we made guinea pigs out of the American public.

3) Since genetically engineered foods are currently being eaten on a daily
basis by millions of U.S. citizens, there was great pressure on the
committee to not alarm the public by suggesting that the current foods are
in any way not safe.

4) The biotech industry is trying to say that this report indicates
genetically engineered crops are safe when the findings clearly raise many
significant safety concerns.

5) The report emphasizes the value and importance of post market tracking of
genetically engineered foods that have been approved for human consumption.
The easiest way to facilitate post market tracking would be to label the
genetically engineered foods. Yet the committee chairwoman is downplaying
the need for post market tracking, undermining this important safety review
that the report emphasizes.

6) As the report points out, the technology does not even currently exist
that is necessary to adequately safety test genetically engineered foods. It
could cost many millions, if not billions, of dollars to develop such technology,
and take many years. In the meantime, people are being fed these risky foods
that have never been adequately tested.

7) Based on the track record of the government agencies that commissioned
this report, it is unlikely they will suddenly change the way they have been
dealing with genetically engineered foods. So, the status quo will likely
remain. And under the current regulations, if a biotech company has a new
genetically engineered product to bring to market, they are not even
required to inform the FDA they are bringing it out.

Again, this type of analysis on the safety of genetically engineered foods
should have been done BEFORE allowing the American public to be made
guinea pigs.

Now that this report has been released indicating the potential for health
problems is real, will the government agencies finally start adequately
regulating genetically engineered foods? Probably not. Most likely it will
take Congressional action to force the agencies to act. This report provides
compelling evidence on why such action from Congress is needed.

Safety testing and labeling should be required for ALL genetically
engineered foods. As the report points out, the current system is inadequate
to assure safety.

Craig Winters
Executive Director
The Campaign to Label Genetically Engineered Foods

The Campaign
PO Box 55699
Seattle, WA 98155
Tel: 425-771-4049
Fax: 603-825-5841
E-mail: mailto:label@thecampaign.org
Web Site: http://www.thecampaign.org

Mission Statement: "To create a national grassroots consumer campaign for
the purpose of lobbying Congress and the President to pass legislation that
will require the labeling of genetically engineered foods in the United
States."

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U.S. science panel: GM plants need more study

Associated Press
July 28, 2004

WASHINGTON - U.S. government regulators should look more closely at the
potential health effects of some genetically modified plants before they can
be grown as commercial crops, a scientific advisory panel said Tuesday.

It also said regulators should check for potential food safety problems
after people eat the products. The report by a committee of the National
Research Council and Institute of Medicine said regulators should target
tighter scrutiny at genetically engineered varieties that have greater
levels of biological differences from current plants.

The analyses also should look more closely at conventionally developed
plants if there are indications naturally occurring chemicals in the
conventional plants could have unintended health effects, the report said.

Some chemicals in plants can create allergic reactions or otherwise make
some people sick. To prevent such problems, the study recommended a
case-by-case approach to the applications based on compounds in
conventional, as well as biotech plants, rather than the current focus on
biotech varieties. The report said, however, biotech plants would probably
have greater risk.

The compounds to be examined could be new ones not normally in the plants,
as well as naturally occurring ones that are above or below healthful
levels, the report said.

To help regulators make their approval decisions, a database should be
developed to list the levels of certain compounds, including healthful
substances such as proteins and dangerous ones such as allergens, the report
said.

The report also said the government should develop better ways to see if
genetically modified foods cause health problems. Among these could be
systems to trace foods with greatly altered levels of those compounds
through the food supply and to check populations to see if there are health
problems among people who eat the foods.

However, the primary focus should be on the preapproval process, "and we
would hope that, for the most part, there wouldn't be a great deal of
postmarket tracking," said the committee chairwoman, Bettie Sue Masters, a
professor of chemistry at the University of Texas Health Science Center in
San Antonio.

The report said genetic engineering of food crops, although relatively new,
appears to be a safe technology and there is no evidence it has harmed
health. Committee members emphasized current biotech crops have gone through
extensive safety checks.

Current biotech crops do not need the tracing or re-examination, said Dean
DellaPenna, a professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at Michigan
State University. The committee's job was to evaluate what could be done for
new applications, he said.

"What we are talking about is from this point going forward," he said.

The committee did not intend for researchers to identify every one of the
thousands of compounds in plants but to focus on the "handful" that might
cause problems, DellaPenna said.

The committee did not consider the cost of implementing its recommendations,
DellaPenna said.

"We are proposing what we think would be ideal recommendations and it is
certainly up to the agencies and Congress to determine how they go forward."

The report was done for the Food and Drug Administration, the Agriculture
Department and the Environmental Protection Agency, which oversee biotech
crop applications.

Michael Phillips, vice-president of agricultural science and regulatory
policy at the Biotechnology Industry Organization, a biotech trade group,
said the report should "lay to rest the few naysayers who continue to
question the safety of these crops."

Consumer advocates said the report also supported their positions.

"The report clearly and correctly states that biotech foods could have
unintended consequences," said Gregory Jaffe, biotechnology project director
of the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

The National Research Council and the Institute of Medicine are arms of the
National Academy of Sciences, a private, congressionally chartered
organization that advises the government on scientific and technical
matters.

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Report Recommends Study Of Genetically Altered Foods
Researchers Suggest Case-By-Case Study On Foods' Safety

July 28, 2004
Internet Broadcasting Systems for NBC News Affiliates

A new report suggests that government agencies should study genetically
altered foods on a case-by-case basis to determine their safety.

The report from the National Academies' National Research Council and the
Institute of Medicine says the foods should be analyzed to see whether
unintended changes in their composition could adversely affect human health.

The researchers said safety evaluations should not be based on the technique
used to alter food because even traditional methods, such as crossbreeding,
can cause unexpected changes.

Instead, researchers suggest, greater scrutiny should be given to foods
containing new compounds or unusual amounts of naturally occurring
substances, regardless of the method used to create them.

"All evidence to date indicates that any breeding technique that alters a
plant or animal -- whether by genetic engineering or other methods -- has
the potential to create unintended changes in the quality or amounts of food
components that could harm health," said committee chairwoman Bettie Sue
Masters.

The report defined genetic engineering of food as deleting genes or to
transferring genes for particular qualities from one species to another.

Researchers said the health effects of genetic engineering have not been
documented. They said genetic engineering is not a hazardous process, but
the food needs to be examined to determine whether the inserted genes
produce toxins or allergens.

The committee was also asked to examine safety issues related to foods from
cloned animals. The researchers said that safety evaluation of foods from
these animals should also focus on the product itself rather than the
process used to create it.

Currently, there is no evidence that foods from cloned animals pose an
increased risk to consumers; however, cloned animals that are engineered to
produce pharmaceuticals should be kept from entering the food chain,
according to the committee's report.

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Panel Sees No Unique Risk From Genetic Engineering

The New York Times
By ANDREW POLLACK
July 28, 2004

Genetically engineered crops do not pose health risks that cannot also arise
from crops created by other techniques, including conventional breeding, the
National Academy of Sciences said in a report issued yesterday.

The conclusion backs the basic approach now underlying government oversight
of biotech foods, that special food safety regulations are not needed just
because foods are genetically engineered.

Nevertheless, the report said that genetic engineering and other techniques
used to create novel crops could result in unintended, harmful changes to
the composition of food, and that scrutiny of such crops should be tightened
before they go to market.

"The most important message from this report is that it's the product that
matters, not the system you are using to produce it," Jennifer Hillard, a
consumer advocate from Canada who was on the committee that wrote the
report, said in a telephone news conference. Committee members said the
genetically engineered foods already on the market are safe.

The study, "Safety of Genetically Engineered Foods: Approaches to Assessing
Unintended Health Effects," is somewhat vague on how regulations should
change, but rather deals more with the science needed to determine whether
food from genetically engineered crops and animals might be harmful.

It does not, for instance, explicitly recommend mandatory reviews of new
genetically engineered foods by the Food and Drug Administration. It says
that assessments should be made on a case-by-case basis. Right now,
companies that create such crops voluntarily consult with the F.D.A.

The report suggests that in some cases, surveillance might be needed after a
food gets to the market to check for possible health effects, something not
done now. It also calls for some information on the composition of
genetically modified foods to be made public rather than kept proprietary.

Both sides in the polarized debate about genetically engineered foods found
things to like and not like in the report.

"They've clearly identified that there are significant problems with our
technological ability to both identify changes that might happen in G.E.
crops as well as to evaluate what those changes might mean," said Doug
Gurian-Sherman, a senior scientist at the Center for Food Safety in
Washington, which opposes biotech crops.

But backers of biotech were heartened by the report's determination that the
risks of biotech foods are not unique. Michael Phillips, vice president of
agricultural science and regulatory policy of the Biotechnology Industry
Organization, said in a statement that the report "should lay to rest the
few naysayers who continue to question the safety of these crops."

The report was commissioned by the three agencies that regulate genetically
engineered crops: the F.D.A, the Department of Agriculture and the
Environmental Protection Agency. It was produced by a committee of mostly
academic scientists led by Bettie Sue Masters, of the department of
biochemistry at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San
Antonio.

Genetic engineering involves the transfer of a specific gene from one
organism to another. Cross-breeding, by contrast, involves the mixing of
thousands of genes, most unknown. Another breeding technique is to bombard
plants with radiation or expose them to chemicals to induce hundreds of
random mutations in hopes of finding one that will confer a desirable trait.

The report said that genetic engineering was more likely to cause unintended
effects than the other techniques used to develop plants except for the
mutation-inducing technique.

Right now, crops produced by techniques other than genetic engineering go
through virtually no regulatory scrutiny.

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