Misleading arguments commonly used by biotech advocates

Comment: This gives the impression that genetic engineering (also called gene modification) acts in the same way as breeding. This is completely wrong. Conventional breeding does not manipulate genes. It just arranges natural mating of selected parents with good traits in order to improve the properties of the offspring. Genetic engineering is totally different. A piece of foreign genetic material is artificially inserted into the genes, (see "What is genetic engineering?" [EL]). As the molecular biologist Michael Antoniou says: "Genetic Engineering and conventional breeding are worlds apart". [EL]

Comment: This is very misleading. It gives the impression that GE is a simple and safe way to change the genetic makeup. This is not true at all.

First of all: Several lethal chronic disorders are caused by one single "little gene". Genes are very powerful. So one "little gene" added to a recipient organism may cause important changes and disturbances, even lethal ones in the worst case.

Second: The added gene commonly comes from an unrelated species. It gives rise to a foreign substance (protein) that never has existed in the organism where the gene is inserted. The total effect of a gene is decided by its environment. Therefore the introduction of a gene in a foreign environment always has unpredictable consequences. Unexpectd substances may appear, some of which may be difficult to detect and harmful, see "GE Possesses Inherent Unpredictability" [EL] and"The safety of GE foods. Reasons to expect hazards and the risk for their appearance" [ML]  [Partly EL].

Third: In genetic engineering the "desired property" gene is never inserted alone. To make the insertion successful, additional genetic material (DNA) is included. This material is taken from pathogenic viruses and bacteria.

There are two categories of additional genetic material associated with the inserted gene:

1. A "promoter complex". It ensures that the inserted gene is active in the new surrounding.
2. A "vector complex" with DNA that promotes gene insertion and prevents rejection by the new host. It counteracts the effective species protection mechanisms that prevent the uptake of foreign genes.

The promoter complex contains so called enhancers that have a non-specific stimulant effect that may activate surrounding genes, thereby causing unexpected biochemical disturbances, see "The safety of GE foods" - The promoter [ML]. The most commonly used promoter comes from the Cauliflower Mosaic Virus (CaMV). It has been demonstrated that its DNA can combine with infecting viruses, thereby generating new and potentially hazardous viruses, see "The Virus Hazard" [ML]. Recent research has shown that the CaMV promoter DNA can be taken up from the intestines and become inserted into the cells of animals, and therefore, most probably, humans. There it may activate dormant genes that may disrupt the normal functioning of the cell. It may also combine with viral genes "sleeping" in the DNA and create new potentially harmful viruses in your body.

The vector DNA is derived from bacteria and contains genetic code sequences that trigger inflammatory responses. Research has shown that such DNA may enter the blood when we eat GE foods. It may cause serious inflammatory disorders in humans, see The fate of food genes and the DNA CpG motif and its impact. [ML]

Even worse, the most common vector, which is taken from the tumor-generating Agrobacterium Tumefaciens, has recently been found to be able to insert into human DNA. This vector has the well known property of initiating tumor growth in plants. Research has found that it attaches to, and genetically transforms several types of human cells in a similar way as when it causes tumor growth in plants.

In addition, some scientists warn that the vector DNA may cause ecological problems. This is because of its ability to promote DNA transfer between unrelated bacteria which can lead to the emergence of new pathogenic bacteria ,see Horizontal transfer [ML]

In conclusion, genetic engineering is far from "just adding a new gene". It has been using viral and bacterial DNA which may become inserted into your cells and may in the worst case cause serious health problems. Moreover it is potentially hazardous to the environment.

Comment: Very deceptive. The truth is that there is no scientific proof that the GE foods on the market are harmless. By saying that there has been no reports about harmful effects, the biotech advocates are implying that there are no reasons for concern. However in fact there has been no careful search for harmful effects. - Absence of evidence of harmfulness does not prove safety!

Considering that it is difficult to detect all harmful side effects of a drug - would you accept to use a very incompletely tested drug just because there has not been any reports about harmful effects? I suppose you would not feel comfortable about it. Yet, in the case of GE foods, this is exactly what you are doing when eating GE foods. Unfortunately, in the US where GE foods are not labeled, you eat them unknowlingly. And there are many such foods on the market.

The reason why there is very little research about the harmfulness of GE foods is that such research is very expensive (billion dollar order of magnitude for each single case of GE organism) and time consuming (takes years). So the industry has heavily and successfully pressed for a relaxation of safety regulations. Consequently no careful safety testing is required. See "Inadequate safety assessment of GE foods."  [EL] An 'at a glance' summary" of food safety assessment procedures revealing their serious inadequacy. See also Why were genetically engineered foods approved in spite of insuffient safety data? [EL]

Comment: The truth is that it has not been established that any GE crop is ecologically harmless . The research to investigate long term environmental effects is very difficult and would take many years in each single case of genetic engineering. So the industry has successfully pressed for an undue relaxation of regulations. An expert appointed by the European Parliament to assess this issue concluded: "Our current knowledge does not provide us with the means to predict the ecological long-term effects of releasing organisms into the environment. So it is beyond the competence of the scientific system to answer such a question..." See EU conclusion.

Against this background the Parliament of the European Union decided to demand a moratorium on the release of GE crops in october 1998. Through strong pressure from the US and WTO, the EU was forced to stop this moratorium in 1994. It was replaced by very strict regulations making it difficult to introduce GE foods and crops.

For more, see "Is there sufficient knowledge about environmental effects to justify release of GE organisms?" [ML]

Comment: This is a very misleading distorsion of the truth.

• Many possible harmful effects, including cancer generation, are of such a kind that they don't cause immediate symptoms. Therefore it is impossible to safely detect them without very careful search, which has not been done.

• In the countries where GE products have been used most widely, US and Canada, there is no mandatory labeling. So it is impossible for people to find out a connection between harmful effects and the food. People may already have been exposed to damage without knowing the cause.

• Recently it has been found that in USA and Canada, the rate of gastrointestinal disorders from "unknown cause" has increased two- to tenfold since 1994 (when GE foods were introduced). Experimental research has demonstrated that GE foods can cause irritation in the intestines and lead to gastrointestinal disease. For more, click here [ML].

Comment: It is an unproven hypothesis tha GE will lead to greatly improved crops. No such crop has been developed so far. It is not certain at all that it would be possible to create GE crops that have a greater productivity than natural crops. In reality, GE crops have generally had lesser productivity than natural ones. See "Can genetic engineering produce crops that increase food production?" [ML].

Moreover, problem of world hunger is not caused by food shortage. There is enough food in the world to feed everybody. Some of the countries with the greatest famines are major exporters of food. The real cause of world hunger is poverty, see "It is a myth that world hunger is due to scarcity of food" [EL].

In addition, a recent study (July 2000) at the United Nations organ FAO arrived at the conclusion that non-GE crops will be sufficient to meet the future needs of mankind (see "FAO report reveals GM crops not needed to feed the world" [EL])

The "world hunger solution argument" has been used to persuade governments to adopt a liberal policy towards GE foods. However, unproven and uncertain benefits of future varieties of GE food are of course completely irrelevant for decisions about approval of present varieties that all are of little of no benefit to mankind (yet this argument has been used by governments as a justification for a liberal approval policy). See also "Do genetically engineered foods provide any benefits?" [EL] and "Can genetic engineering produce crops that increase food production?"

Actually, extensive experience has shown that industrial farming has increased world hunger by making millions of peasants unemployed, with no alternative incomes.

"Far from staving off world starvation, genetic engineering is set to threaten crop yields; to force farmers to pay for their rights to fertile seed; to undercut foreign demand for some Third World produce: and to undermine poorer farmers' access to land on which to grow food. Its cruelly deceptive promise of a technical fix for many people's lack of food not only conceals the unjust distribution of land and of economic and political power which underpin world hunger today: if adopted widely, genetic engineering technologies in agriculture would also entrench and extend these forces." Source: Genetic Engineering and World Hunger The Cornerhouse (1998) Briefing 10.

Comment: The complete opposite is true. A more adequate description of biotechnology would be that it applies a very early stage of knowledge about a very difficult and complex field that will take many of years of extensive investigation before it is really understood. The knowledge is far too incomplete to make it possible to predict and master the effects of the insertion of a gene. See  "Is our knowledge sufficient for safe use biotechnology?""  [EL]

Moreover, Genetic engineering is based on an outdated idea of genes. GE was invented at a time when it was believed that a gene gives rise to the same property wherever it is inserted. This is not the case, and that is one of the reasons why the results are unpredictable, see "The new understanding of genes"[ML].

Comment: This is a half truth. The extraction of the desired gene is indeed done with High Tech precision. But the insertion is the opposite. With the present methods used in genetic engineering of food it has been impossible to guide the insertion of the gene. It is ZERO precision. And it is the precision of the insertion that really counts as this has a decisive effect on the outcome. This is because the effect of a gene is dependent on interaction with its surroundings.

So contrary to what this argument implies, the genetic engineers have no control over the outcome of gene insertion. In addition, because of the very incomplete knowledge about DNA"  [ML] , it would be impossible to know the outcome even if the insertion could be exactly guided.

Comment: This is a completely unproven statement. Yet it is often used in the propaganda. There has been no general poll about the opinion of scientists. The only poll we know about this matter showed the opposite:

A survey on attitudes toward biotechnology was made at Cornell University, one of the foremost universities in the US. It involved the agricultural and nutrition-science faculty and extension staff (who advise farmers). It was found that nearly half had reservations about the health, safety, and environmental impacts of GM crops and doubt they are the answer to global hunger. Only 37% were strong biotech supporters, while 8% thought agricultural biotech might have useful applications and help alleviate global hunger, but were concerned about food safety and inadequate testing. Though in the minority, the biotech promoters said they felt very comfortable voicing their views in public, in contrast to the concerned majority that did not. (Source: "Independent Scientists An Endangered Species". ISIS Report, September 4, 2001).

This reflects a great problem especially in applied science today. Because corporations are funding a large part of the research, critical scientists are often silenced so as to keep the industry happy. As almost only biotech supporting scientists appear in the media, a false impression is created that all scientists are for it. For more about this problem, see Dysfunctional science.

An illustrative quote: "...as corporations are growing bigger and more powerful, so the suppression of scientific dissent is becoming more sophisticated, insidious and extensive. As the scientific and the political mainstream have both come to identify with corporate aims, so their established power structures are brought to bear on squashing scientific dissent and engineering consensus." (Source: "Independent Scientists An Endangered Species").

Comment: This is another confusing argument that has been used to create favorable attitudes to GE foods. It is designed to inhibit criticism as people are afraid of being regarded as "anti-progressive".

Real progress is based on responsible and insightful application of new knowledge, which requires careful investigation of the risks. Such investigation is especially important as, in this case, we deal with a very profound and powerful level of life. Also any release of engineered DNA into nature is irreversible, and may pollute the DNA of natural organisms for all times to come. Therefore an understanding of consequences is especially important.

However, as you have learnt above, there is very little knowledge of health and environmental consequences. Moreover there are great deficiencies in the understanding of the manipulated object, the living cell and its controlling code, the DNA.

What we are witnessing now is a blind experimentation with the health of people and with the environment through the release of GE organisms and approval of them as foods. In the commonly accepted sense of the word, that is not called "progress", rather the opposite. Real progress would be to stop the GE foods. See also: "Is it progress to exploit Genetically Engineered food?"[EL]

Comment: This is another smart manipulation of the feelings of people. Nobody wants to be a coward. It builds on the thinking in the bussiness world that one has to take some risk to make progress in business. But there is a huge difference here.

In business, you can reliably calculate the level of risk of a project and the profit it will yield, but this is completely impossible with genetic engineering.

Would you find it wise to invest a million into a project where the risk cannot be calculated, and there is no reliable way to determine if there will be any profit at all? This is exactly the situation with genetic engineering. Every competent bussinessman would call such an investment sheer stupidity.

Such misleading arguments have been skilfully delivered by top level journalists hired by the PR firms serving biotech corporations. The articles, TV and radio presentations have an impartial, objective style reinforced by scientific illustrations and quotes by scientists from leading universities. In addition it is often hinted that any criticism of GE foods is only the consequence of ignorance and "irrational consumer fears" of new technologies.

- The illusion of objective and scientific information is perfect. Yes, it is so perfect that, if you have not encountered any critical information before about GE foods, you are likely to be skeptical when you read this. Such skeptisism against any criticism of GE foods has been built up over several years of repeated exposures to this pro-biotech information delivered by star journalists in different media, all saying essentially the same thing. - Propaganda experts say that if you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes perceived as the truth.

Whom to belive?

- The corporations who have a commercial interest in selling their products? And the laudations of its (often covertly) hired top journalists and (likewise often covertly) sponsored professors from leading universities?

- Or an independent interdisciplinary non-profit NGO that has no other interest than to uncover the truth in order to defend the health of mankind and to preserve the environment from irreparable damage (see About us).

What to believe?

- The best solution for you is to understand the facts on your own, independent of the opinion of anyone else. This is why we have done our best to write this site in such a way everybody can understand the essential facts. The key facts are simple:

It is scientifically established beyond any reasonable doubt that:

1. The knowledge about the hereditary substance, DNA is very incomplete. See
   • "Is our knowledge sufficient for safe use biotechnology?""  [EL]
   • Defintely proven - Gene technology is unsafe  [EL]
2. The artificial insertion of genes may cause unpredictable disturbances resulting in the creation of harmful substances (see "The safety of GE foods"). [ML]
   
3. The detection of unexpected substances is difficult and requires far more advanced and rigorous testing than presently demanded (see Inadequate safety assessment of GE foods).  [EL]
4. No GE food on the market has been tested rigorously enough to ensure its safety. This is the reason why over 160 scientists and physicians from all over the world demand that all such GE foods should be withdrawn from the market (see Open letter to governments  [EL]).
5. No GE-organism approved so far has been investigated for environmental consequences in a sufficiently careful way to ensure its ecological safety. See "Is there sufficient knowledge about environmental effects to justify release of GE organisms?" [ML]

Jaan Suurkula M.D.

Related reading

• PR strategies used to manipulate opinions about GE foods.
• The enemies of democracy.