Archive for the ‘GMO’s’ Category

GMOs in the News

GMO’s in the News   2015

 

Here’s our first new update for 2015.

Below is a new book coming out next week that I am buying. Link below.

Some other important news as well.

Mom

 

The Massive Fraud Behind GMOs Exposed

by COLIN TODHUNTER

This is not what the GMO industry wanted to see: banner headlines today in major newspapers and across the internet exposing the fraud behind GMOs. But this constitutes much more than a PR nightmare. The story behind the headlines shakes the very foundations upon which the industry is built.

Altered Genes, Twisted Truth’ is a new book by the US public interest lawyer Steve Druker. The book is the result of more than 15 years of intensive research and investigation by Druker, who initiated a lawsuit against the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) that forced it to divulge its files on GM foods. Those files revealed that GM foods first achieved commercialisation in 1992 but only because the FDA covered up the extensive warnings of its own scientists about their dangers, lied about the facts and then violated federal food safety law by permitting these foods to be marketed without having been proven safe through standard testing.

If the FDA had heeded its own experts’ advice and publicly acknowledged their warnings that GM foods entailed higher risks than their conventional counterparts, Druker says that the GM food venture would have imploded and never gained traction anywhere.

He also argues that that many well-placed scientists have repeatedly issued misleading statements about GM foods, and so have leading scientific institutions such as the US National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the UK’s Royal Society.

Druker states that contrary to the claims of biotech advocates, humans have indeed been harmed by consuming the output of genetic engineering. The technology’s first ingestible product (a food supplement of the essential amino acid, L-tryptophan) caused dozens of deaths and seriously sickened thousands of people (permanently disabling many of them). Moreover, the evidence points to the genetic alteration as the most likely cause of the unusual contamination that rendered the supplement toxic.

He explains that laboratory animals have also suffered from eating products of genetic engineering, and well-conducted tests with GM crops have yielded many troubling results, including intestinal abnormalities, liver disturbances, and impaired immune systems.

 

Read the rest here: http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/03/06/the-massive-fraud-behind-gmos-exposed/

 

 

 

 

 

New Study: Huge Increase in US Chronic Diseases Linked to Glyphosate Herbicides

 

A new correlation study published on Friday in the Journal of Organic Systems has linked the world’s number one herbicide, glyphosate, to a huge increase in the incidence of  chronic diseases across the United States.

 

In the most detailed analysis yet performed on the correlation between the use of glyphosate-based pesticides and rates of chronic diseases, a team including Dr. Nancy Swanson and the President of the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM), Andre Leu, identified a serious link between the increase in the use of glyphosate in the U.S. and diseases such as diabetes, obesity, lipoprotein metabolism disorder, Alzheimer’s, senile dementia, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis and autism.

 

What is Glyphosate?

PCBs, DDT and Agent Orange all had very harmful effects on women, men and children across the Globe in the 20th Century. Glyphosate-based herbicides have been identified as the next dangerous widely used chemical on this list. It is time for some real action to be taken to find out the full extent of the harm being caused to the environment and human health by glyphosate the world’s number one weed killer.

 

Glyphosate, or N-(phosphonomethyl)glycine, is a broad-spectrum herbicide, meaning it kills all plant life. Glyphosate was developed by John E. Franz of Monsanto Company. It was first introduced in 1974.

Glyphosate-containing herbicides are now the top-selling herbicides in the world and are sold under trademarks such as Monsanto’s ‘Roundup’.

Numerous glyphosate-based herbicide formulations (e.g. Roundup, Clearout 41) are now produced by at least 100 manufacturers worldwide.

 

Glyphosate herbicides are used by farmers to kill weeds in crop fields. But their use is not restricted to farming. Public authorities spray them along roads, on pavements, and in public parks to control weeds. Even home gardeners use them. They are sold in supermarkets and garden centres.

 

The new study  states:

“Within the last 20 years there has been an alarming increase in serious illnesses in the US, along with a marked decrease in life expectancy (Bezruchka, 2012). The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that the cost of diabetes and diabetes-related treatment was approximately $116 billion dollars in 2007. Estimated costs related to obesity were $147 billion in 2008 and cardiovascular diseases and stroke were $475.3 billion in 2009. Health care expenditures in the US totaled 2.2 trillion dollars in 2007 (CDC, 2013a). The onset of serious illness is appearing in increasingly younger cohorts. The US leads the world in the increase in deaths due to neurological diseases between 1979-81 and 2004-06 for the 55-65 age group (Pritchard et al., 2013).

“These mental disorder deaths are more typical of the over 65 age group. There have been similar findings for obesity, asthma, behavior and learning problems, and chronic disease in children and young adults (Van Cleave et al., 2010). Type II diabetes in youth is being called an epidemic (Rosenbloom et al., 1999). The rate of chronic disease in the entire US population has been dramatically increasing with an estimated 25% of the US population suffering from multiple chronic diseases (Autoimmunity Research Foundation, 2012). These findings suggest environmental triggers rather than genetic or age-related causes.

“During this same time period, there has been an exponential increase in the amount of glyphosate applied to food crops and in the percentage of GE food crops planted (Benbrook, 2012). We undertook a study to see if correlations existed between the rise of GE crops, the associated glyphosate use and the rise in chronic disease in the US.”

 

Read the rest and find the link to the paper here:

http://sustainablepulse.com/2014/11/07/new-study-huge-increase-us-chronic-diseases-linked-glyphosate-herbicides/#.VQMhv2bOWS0

 

Kellogg’s Froot Loops Tests Positive For GMOs and Weedkiller
In 2013, GMO Free USA sent a sample of Froot Loops to a certified lab to test for the presence of GMO material. The quantitative PCR test verified, by DNA analysis, that 100% of the corn in the Froot Loops was GMO, containing DNA sequences known to be present in insecticide producing Bt and Roundup Ready corn.  The soy contained DNA sequences known to be present in Roundup Ready GMO soy. This year we plan to continue testing for the presence of GMOs in various food products and now we have expanded our testing to include glyphosate. GMO Free USA plans to further expand testing to include 2,4-D, dicamba, atrazine, and neonicotinoid insecticides.

 

Read more here:

 

http://www.gmofreeusa.org/food-testing/kelloggs/kelloggs-froot-loops/

 

End double standards in evaluating GMO safety studies – say scientists

 

Europe’s food safety agency only criticises studies that find risk, new analysis shows

ENSSER Press release

 

The controversy about the Séralini et al. study, which reported negative health effects of Monsanto’s NK603 GM maize and Roundup herbicide fed to rats over the long term,[1] is still going on. According to a new review published in Environmental Sciences Europe, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) used unscientific double standards to dismiss the Séralini study on genetically modified (GM) maize.[2]

The publication of this latest review comes just days after the retraction of the Séralini paper by Elsevier, the publisher of Food and Chemical Toxicology (FCT), on the unprecedented grounds of the “inconclusive” nature of some of the findings. ENSSER condemned the retraction[3] .

The Séralini study triggered an immediate storm of criticism by scientists and organisations, most of whom are known for their support of GMOs and their pleas for sweeping deregulation of GM plants in the EU and relaxation or even abandonment of risk assessment standards.[4]

Retrospective and selective application of new standards by EFSA

In September 2012, the European Commission asked EFSA to review the Séralini study. EFSA did so by retrospectively applying new standards released in 2011 to scientific work that Séralini planned and started in 2008.[5] EFSA concluded that the Séralini study was “inadequate”.[6]

But EFSA did not apply these same standards retrospectively to the original rat feeding study by Monsanto, even though the underlying design for the Monsanto study was later repeated by Seralini.[7] The Monsanto study concluded that this same GM maize was safe to eat, resulting in the approval for consumption of this GM crop by millions of animals and EU citizens in 2005.

EFSA review undermined the basic principles of science

Hartmut Meyer, one of the authors of the new review, said, “Use of such double standards is a common response from scientists calling for GMO deregulation and, somewhat surprisingly, also from some government authorities, to studies that show negative environmental and health effects of GMOs. Only those studies that find problems are subjected to excessive scrutiny and rejected as defective. This approach appears to be a tactic to avoid dealing with ‘inconvenient’ results, whilst selecting for ‘convenient’ results.”

The new review then applied the same criteria used by EFSA to reject the Séralini study to 21 other 1-2-year feeding studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals during the last 20 years. Those studies did not test feed derived from GM plants but mostly chemicals, used the same strain of rat, similar low numbers of tested animals and likewise modified protocols that extended or diverged to some degree from the strict OECD protocols and EFSA criteria as both Seralini and Monsanto did.

Restore scientific principles of objectivity

Angelika Hilbeck, the second author of the new review and chair of the European Network of Scientists for Social and Environmental Responsibility (ENSSER), said, “ENSSER wants to see scientific objectivity restored. We are calling for an end to the use of double standards, particularly by EFSA, in the evaluation of scientific research on substances that may pose risks to public health. We need a reasoned, respectful debate with the aim of reaching a consensus on the evaluation standards that must be consistently applied to all toxicity and carcinogenicity trials, regardless of whether they have findings that are ‘inconvenient’ for certain parties. EFSA should take the lead here.”

“It’s time to stop selectively attacking methods and begin to deal with the results.”

Double standards used to claim GMO safety

Another example of selective scrutiny of study methods in order to avoid dealing with the results is a review of GMO safety studies conducted by Snell et al. (2012)[8]. In their review of 24 animal feeding trials with GM plant-derived feed, the authors noticed severe methodological shortcomings in a majority of the analysed publications, e.g. isogenic lines as controls were only used in 10 studies. However, Snell et al. used these shortcomings as arguments to dismiss those studies stating negative effects – but not those stating safety. Based on this asymmetrical, result-triggered approach, the review incorrectly concludes that no health hazards were found in 24 analysed publications.

 

 

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GMOs in the News

GMOs in the News

Haven’t done a news update in awhile. Isn’t it amazing, when we started Moms for Safe Food in 2009, barely anyone had heard of GMOs. But thanks to Pamm Larry and CA Prop 37, and Jeffrey Smith from the Institute of Responsible Technology and many others we are finally joining together to get GMOs labeled and out of our food supply.

Monsanto and their biotech cronies keep telling the same lies (feed the world, safe, blah, blah blah)  and their starting to use what used to be the liberal press to pass along their lies – I no longer trust Mother Jones or NPR – seems like they’ve both been bought out by Biotech.

Keep it up – we are gaining momentum and WILL win this fight!

Love,  Mom

Argentina stalls Monsanto corn project on environmental concerns

on 12 February 2014.

Following an historic court victory in which Argentine protestors won a court injunction halting construction of a Monsanto GMO seed plant, local authorities have rejected the company’s environmental impact assessment.

More about the protestors’ court win:

http://gmwatch.org/index.php/news/archive/2014/15246

Argentina stalls Monsanto corn project on environmental concerns – update

Shane Romig

Wall St Journal, 11 Feb 2014

http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20140211-715316.html

Monsanto Co. hit another roadblock in its plans to build a 1.5 billion peso ($192 million) corn-seed production plant in Argentina’s Cordoba province after local authorities rejected Monsanto’s environmental impact assessment.

The project has been on hold since September after clashes with protesters led the St. Louis biotech company to halt construction after completing about 30% of the work.

Monsanto’s environmental assessment didn’t “identify the relevant impacts and resulting mitigation measures,” the office of Cordoba Governor José Manuel de la Sota said in a statement late Monday.

The company said Tuesday it accepted the findings and would move to bring the project in line with the new requirements.

Monsanto “is starting from scratch with the whole process, and preparing a new environmental assessment with new standards,” Pablo Vaquero, Monsanto’s director of sustainability and corporate affairs for Latin America South, said in an interview.

It will take a month or two to analyze the air, soil, and water at the site and prepare a new assessment, Mr. Vaquero said.

A small group of environmental activists have camped out in front of the Cordoba construction site since September, blocking the road and preventing vehicles from coming in or out.

“The reality is that the environmental groups are opposed to Argentina’s farming model,” Mr. Vaquero said.

Those protesters celebrated the rejection of the environmental-impact assessment.

“We’re overjoyed,” Matías Marizza, a member of the Malvinas Fight for Life Assembly told Cordoba radio station FM Las Higueras on Tuesday. “There’s no turning back. Monsanto has to go,” he said.

Read more here:

http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php/news/archive/2014/15300-argentina-stalls-monsanto-corn-project-on-environmental-concerns

 

California State Senator Introduces New GMO Labeling Bill

by Maureen Nandini Mitra – February 25, 2014

SB 1381 is a cleaner version of Prop 37, say bill proponents

California’s gearing up for round two of the GMO labeling debate. This time though the battle will be duked out in the state legislature rather than in the public arena.

Photo courtesy Senator Evans’ OfficeLast Friday, state Senator Noreen Evans, a Democrat from Santa Rosa, introduced a new bill
to label GM foods sold in California.

On Friday, state Senator Noreen Evans, a Democrat from Santa Rosa, introduced a new bill to label GM foods sold in California. SB 1381 would require food sold in state grocery stores to be labeled if it contains genetically engineered ingredients. The bill’s proponents say it is basically a cleaner, more streamlined version of Prop 37, the 2012 ballot initiative to label GMOs that was defeated at the polls.

Sponsored by a coalition of 17 environmental, consumer, food groups, and small businesses called Californians for GE Food Labeling, SB 1381 provides more protections for farmers and retailers, and places limits on potential litigation. The bill will most likely be assigned to the California senate health committee by mid-March.

“This legislation provides more clarity on who’s responsible for labeling or mislabeling,” says Rebecca Spector, West Coast director of the Center for Food Safety, the group that was lead author of the legislation. “The retailer is only responsible for labeling fresh produce at point of purchase. The bill also makes it clear that farmers are not liable unless they have intentionally misled retailers.” The Center, incidentally, had also co-authored Prop 37.

California voters rejected the ballot initiative in 2012 by a less than 3 percent margin. Spector says post-election polling showed that 21 percent of all California voters who voted against Prop. 37 reported they support labeling of GE foods but were confused about certain provisions of the initiative. Also certain provisions in Prop 37, such as banning any processed food from being labeled as natural, had alienated groups like the Natural Products Association, which should typically have been allies.

The new bill, Spector says, doesn’t include this provision. It also minimizes the risk of farmers, food manufacturers, and retailers being sued. “If a company is notified of a violation it will have a 60-day period to correct their labeling prior to a lawsuit moving forward, and there’s no fixed penalty,” Spector says.

The bill has strong support from the district Senator Evans represents, SD2, which spans over one-third of the Northern California coast from Santa Rosa to Eureka and has a huge sustainable farming community. “Those folks are very engaged,” says Teala Schaff, spokesperson for Senator Evans. Schaff says “a lot people from across the nation” too, have been calling since Friday to express support for SB 1381 which she described as “a strong consumer protection bill.”

“People want to know if their food is organic, they want to know how much salt or fat is there…  this is no different. It’s not precluding these products from being available in the market,” Schaff says.

Indeed, polls have shown that 93 percent of US citizens want GM foods labeled and the push for labeling has gathering momentum lately. Last year most than half of US states introduced GMO labeling bills, though only two such bills passed in Connecticut and Maine. This year, a GMO labeling bill was just passed by Vermont’s agricultural committee. In March, Albany, NY, and Annapolis, MD, will be holding public hearing on GMO labeling bills, and voters in Oregon will likely vote on a similar initiative this fall.

Read more here:

http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/elist/eListRead/california_state_senator_introduces_new_gmo_labeling_bill

 

 

Nine Dirty Little Secrets About GMOs

Posted: Updated:

By Robyn O’Brien

More:

Label GMOs GMO Farmed and Dangerous Monsanto Food for Thought Food News

This blog is part of a series that explores the themes and issues raised in Farmed and Dangerous, a 4-part satirical web series exploring issues related to the food system and industrial agriculture. If you’re interested in joining the conversation, please contact us at [email protected].

Transparency is sexy. Misleading people, not so much.

If you had no idea that ingredients, labeled by the EPA as pesticides, are hiding in your food, you’re not alone.

Here are nine dirty little secrets about GMOs that impact everyone from farmers to families to the financials of our economy:

1. Shh, don’t mention the food waste: “We need this technology to feed to world,” is the marketing cry of the big chemical companies. In truth, they do need this technology to feed the expectations of shareholders, but it turns out that more than one-third of the food produced in the world goes to waste. That amounts to 1.3 billion tons every year, costing us economically. In this country alone, we throw away 96 billion pounds of food every year, or 27 percent of the total amount of available food. That’s 3,000 pounds of food a second. With the United Nations on record saying that we need more than just genetically engineered food tools in the toolbox, it appears what we also need is a smarter distribution model to address this waste.

2. Forget Big Tobacco, it’s Big Razor’s playbook: Gillette will practically give away the razor to get people hooked on buying the razor blade. It’s a smart strategy for chemical companies, too. They offer the genetically engineered seed at a discount, then get farmers on the hook for buying the chemicals and suite of chemical products required to make their seeds grow. Pesticide application is up 527 million pounds since the introduction of these genetically engineered crops.

3. EPA now regulates this genetically engineered corn as a pesticide. Seriously, if you had the choice on your kitchen table or at a BBQ between a corn regulated by the EPA as a pesticide and one that wasn’t, which would you choose? No brainer. We should know which one is the pesticide and which foods it is going into.

4. Pre-treated seeds doused in chemicals: It’s called an accelerating agent, and seeds are pretreated before they are ever even put in the ground. Is it any wonder that farmers using these seeds are increasingly worried about what it is doing to the quality of their soil?

5. Pouring on the Pesticides: The latest analysis shows that genetically engineered crops have driven up overall pesticide use across the country, contributing to a 527 million pound increase in herbicide use between 1996 and 2011. And last year alone, genetically engineered crops used 20 percent more pesticides on average than non-GE crops. Who pays for that? Farmers and the people that eat them. Who benefits? The chemical companies selling the seeds engineered to withstand these increasing doses. It goes straight to the bottom line and into the bank.

6. Patent the Chemicals as a Drug: The increasingly controversial weed killer, glyphosate, has been patented an antibiotic: Who knew that the patent had been filed? Apparently the US Patent and Trademark Office. As a growing number of farmers express concern over what this chemical is doing to their soil as headlines around the world express concern over what it is doing to humans, you have to ask yourself: given the 21st century technology we have today, is it time to make this 20th century, chemically intensive operating system, obsolete?

7. Patents protect intellectual property: “The development of genetic engineering of plants in the 1980s was accompanied by a sequence of increasingly specific confirmations of the patentability of various types of life forms, provided that they met the standard patent criteria of novelty, utility and nonobviousness.” Nonobviousness is pretty discreet. So let’s say a pediatric cancer or autism group wanted to study if these crops and chemicals are contributing to the rates of cancer or autism. They’d have to go to Monsanto or the other big chemical companies for permission. It’s worth considering that just as Big Tobacco did before it, these chemical companies just might possibly be relying upon concealment of its documents from the public under intellectual property law to avoid liabilities and to evade regulation.

8. Technology Stewardship Agreements lock farmers into contracts for genetically engineered seeds. Want to break the contract? They’ll sue you. A farmer in Iowa is living testament to this happening. Once he realized that the details of that contract locked him into purchasing Monsanto’s suite of products for the life of the farm, it felt like a noose. When he wanted out, they made a point of showing the farming world that it wasn’t an option and sued.

9. Labels mean liability: Right now the companies using these genetically engineered foods want a ban on state labeling and are trying to stop a growing call for mandatory national labeling. Why? Because without labels, this “GMO Buyers Club” can claim that there is no evidence that these crops have ever caused any harm. And guess what? Without labels, they are right, there is no evidence. Labels would bring accountability, traceability and liability. It’s no wonder that the food industry is so allergic to labeling these genetically engineered ingredients in the United States. An allergic reaction to food sends someone to the ER once every three minutes.

We label the inside parts of our cars, our cell phones and our computers, so why is the chemical industry so cloaked about what goes into our food?

Can you imagine if Intel operated this way? There would be no Intel Inside and no way of knowing which parts of the operating system were functioning as promised and which parts might be detrimental to the system.

We’ve got GMO Inside our food, but no label to tell us.

The chemical industry argues that labeling would drive up food costs, and they would have to pass these added expenses on to consumers. But it doesn’t ring true, especially when you look at how American food companies label these ingredients in the products that they sell overseas and at the number of label changes for pink ribbons, Easter Bunnies or holiday packaging.

Without labels on genetically engineered ingredients, the industry can claim “no evidence of harm.” And they are right. Without labels, there is no traceability, accountability and liability. No way for these companies to be held accountable for the costs that they are externalizing onto society, our farmers, their farms and our economy.

But if the tobacco industry is any indication, it is only a matter of time before these externalized costs come back onto the financial statements of the chemical companies. Farmers and families are being impacted, and there is an antecedent here: it is Medicaid Third Party Liability (TPL) recovery obtained from “Big Tobacco,” totaling $240 billion.

As the number of food companies opting out of these ingredients grows, so too, does the number of attorneys who have children that are impacted by food allergies and other conditions.

The food awakening is on, and the companies that are opting out of genetically engineered ingredients and willing to be transparent with the consumers are capturing market share.

That is sexy to shareholders.

Hiding your ingredients and making food dirty with GMOs and lots of chemicals? Not so much.

Farmed and Dangerous was produced by Chipotle and production company Piro. Chipotle is the sponsor for the Food For Thought initiative.

From: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robyn-o/nine-dirty-little-secrets_b_4808630.html?view=print&comm_ref=false

 

 

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Happy New Year – Let’s keep it up!

Here’s a great video remembering Prop 37.  We will not give up!

Happy New Year!

Mom

 

 

Why GMOs Can Never Be Safe

Great article by Dr. Mercola!

By Dr. Mercola

Monsanto and other biotech companies claim genetically modified (GM) crops have no impact on the environment and are perfectly safe to eat.

Federal departments in charge of food safety in the US and Canada have not conducted tests to affirm this alleged “safety,” but rather have taken the industry-conducted research at face value, allowing millions of acres of GM crops to overtake farmland.

These foods, largely in the form of GM corn and soy (although there are other GM crops, too, like sugar beets, papaya and crookneck squash), can now be found in the majority of processed foods in the US.

In other words, if you eat processed foods, you’re already eating them… and these crops are already being freely planted in the environment. But what if it turns out that Monsanto was wrong, and the GM crops aren’t actually safe…

This is precisely what a number of scientists have been warning of for years, and the latest to sound the alarm is Dr. Mae-Wan Ho of the Institute for Science in Society, who has concluded that, by their very nature, there is no way GMOs (genetically modified organisms) can be safe.

10 GM Myths That Monsanto Wants You to Believe

Monsanto is the world leader in GM crops, and their Web site would have you believe that they are the answer to world hunger. Thanks to their heavy PR campaign, if you’ve been primarily a reader of the mainstream press, you’ve probably been misled into thinking GM crops are, in fact, the greatest thing since sliced bread, that they provide better yields of equal or better quality food, pest and weed resistance, reduced reliance on pesticides, and more… But thankfully, the truth is unfolding and the tide is finally beginning to turn.

The Organic Prepper4 recently highlighted 10 GM myths that Monsanto wants you to believe … but which are actually far from the truth.

Myth #1: No one has ever proven that GMOs are harmful to people

The truth is that studies of GM food have shown tumors, premature death, organ failure, gastric lesions, liver damage, kidney damage, allergic reactions, and more.

Myth #2: GM crops are the only way to solve world hunger

The reality is that GM farming practices are not sustainable, which virtually guarantees future crop collapses and subsequent famine. Nor are farmers able to save their seeds due to patent infringement and poor fertility in the seeds. Sustainable agricultural practices are the answer to world hunger.

Myth #3: GM crops need less pesticide spraying

The truth is that after the first couple of years, the use of pesticides and herbicides on GM crops has increased dramatically.

Myth #4: GM technology is comparable to the cross-breeding that our ancestors did to create hardier versions of heritage crops

Cross pollination of different varieties of the same plant (what our ancestors did) is low-tech and can occur naturally. Genetic modification of seeds is done in a lab and often crosses different biological kingdoms, such as crossing a bacteria with a plant the unintended adverse effects of which may be incalculably large and impossible to ascertain before they are released into the biosphere.

Myth #5: If the FDA and the USDA allow them, they must be safe

Monsanto has close ties with the US government, such that, despite the obvious conflict of interest, Monsanto executives have been given policy-making positions in Bush, Clinton and Obama administrations.

Myth #6: There is no nutritional difference between GM food and non-GM food

A 2012 nutritional analysis of GM versus non-GM corn showed shocking differences in nutritional content. Non-GM corn contains 437 times more calcium, 56 times more magnesium, and 7 times more manganese than GM corn. GM corn was also found to contain 13 ppm of glyphosate, a pesticide so toxic that it may be carcinogenic in the parts-per-trillion range, compared to zero in non-GM corn.

Myth #7: GMOs are impossible to avoid

GM ingredients are found in more than 70 percent of processed foods, but you can largely avoid them by avoiding these processed foods. By switching to whole foods like vegetables, fruits, grass-fed meats and other basic staples, you can control the GM foods in your diet.

Myth #8: Monsanto has our best interests in mind

Monsanto has spent over half a million dollars on hiring a firm to help ‘protect the Monsanto brand name’ from activists. There is speculation that they have placed trolls on anti-GM Web sites, hidden posts from social media, and even possibly hacked researchers computers days before they were set to release a damaging study. There’s even speculation that the US government is spying on anti-Monsanto activists.

Myth #9: GMOs are not harmful to the environment

On the Hawaiian island of Molokai, where a nearly 2,000-acre test facility for Monsanto sits, air and water quality are horrendous and there are reports of deaths, infertility, uncontrolled cross-pollination, bloody skin rashes, asthma and pesticide contamination in the groundwater.

Myth #10: GMOs are here to stay

Biotech wants you to believe that GM crops are here to stay, but a war is being waged against GMOs, and the resistance is gaining significant ground. By sharing information like this, we can fight back against biotech and the poisons they’re releasing into our environment.

The Greatest Danger of Genetic Modification

According to Dr. Mae-Wan Ho, genetic modification interferes fundamentally with the natural genetic modifications that organisms undergo in order to survive. Under natural circumstances, this is done in real time as “an exquisitely precise molecular dance of life.”

Genetic engineering, which assumes that one protein determines one particular trait, such as herbicide tolerance or insect resistance, and can easily be swapped out with another, with no other effects, is dangerously simplistic or, as Dr. Mae-Wan Ho says, “an illusion.”

An organism’s genome is not static but fluid, and its biological functions are interconnected with its environment and vice versa, such that trying to control genetic changes via artificial modification is a dangerous game. Dr. Ho explained:

“The rationale and impetus for genetic engineering and genetic modification is the ‘central dogma’ of molecular biology that assumes DNA (deoxyribose nucleic acid) carries all the instructions for making an organism.

Individual ‘genetic messages’ in DNA faithfully copied into RNA (ribosenucleic acid), is then translated into a protein via a genetic code; the protein determining a particular trait, such as herbicide tolerance, or insect resistance; one gene, one character. If it were really as simple as that, genetic modification would work perfectly. Unfortunately this simplistic picture is an illusion.

Instead of linear causal chains leading from DNA to RNA to protein and downstream biological functions, complex feed-forward and feed-back cycles interconnect organism and environment at all levels to mark and change RNA and DNA down the generations … Organisms work by intercommunication at every level, and not by control.

… In order to survive, the organism needs to engage in natural genetic modification in real time, an exquisitely precise molecular dance of life in which RNA and DNA respond to, and participate fully in ‘downstream’ biological functions.

That is why organisms and ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to the crude, artificial GM RNA and DNA created by human genetic engineers. It is also why genetic modification can probably never be safe. More importantly, the human organism shapes its own development and evolutionary future; that is why we must take responsible action to ban all environmental releases of GMOs now.”

Natural Genetic Modification is Different From Artificial Genetic Modification

Similar to the way artificial immunity acquired by vaccination is assumed to be the same thing as natural immunity acquired by contracting and recovering from an illness, genetic modification is often thought to be the same, whether it’s done in a lab or by nature. But as we’ve seen with immunity, there are actually very important differences, and these, too, are highlighted by Dr. Ho. Compared with natural genetic modification, artificial genetic modification is inherently hazardous because it lacks the precision of the natural process, while enabling genes to be transferred between species that would never have been exchanged otherwise.

“There is, therefore, nothing natural about artificial genetic modification done in the lab,” Dr. Ho stated.

Contrasting natural and artificial genetic modification:1
Natural Genetic Modification Artificial Genetic Modification
Precisely negotiated by the organism as a whole Crude, imprecise, unpredictable uncontrollable
Takes place at the right place & time without damaging the genome Forced into cells with no control over where & in what forms the artificial constructs land with much collateral damage to the genome
Appropriate to the organism as a whole in relation to its environment Aggressive promoters force foreign genes to be expressed out of context

GM DNA Is Transferring to Humans and the Environment

Another problem with genetic modification has to do with the fact that GM plants and animals are created using horizontal gene transfer (also called horizontal inheritance), as contrasted with vertical gene transfer, which is the mechanism in natural reproduction. Vertical gene transfer, or vertical inheritance, is the transmission of genes from the parent generation to offspring via sexual or asexual reproduction, i.e., breeding a male and female from one species.

By contrast, horizontal gene transfer involves injecting a gene from one species into a completely different species, which yields unexpected and often unpredictable results. Proponents of GM assume they can apply the principles of vertical inheritance to horizontal inheritance, but this assumption, too, is flawed, and now it’s been confirmed that GM genes can transfer to humans and the environment. Dr. Ho stated:

“It is now clear that horizontal transfer of GM DNA does happen, and very often. Evidence dating from the early 1990s indicates that ingested DNA in food and feed can indeed survive the digestive tract, and pass through the intestinal wall to enter the bloodstream. The digestive tract is a hotspot for horizontal gene transfer to and between bacteria and other microorganisms.

… Higher organisms including human beings are even more susceptible to horizontal gene transfer than bacteria, because unlike bacteria, which require sequence homology (similarity) for incorporation into the genome, higher organisms do not.

… What are the dangers of GM DNA from horizontal gene transfer? Horizontal transfer of DNA into the genome of cells per se is harmful, but there are extra dangers from the genes or genetic signals in the GM DNA, and also from the vector used in delivering the transgene(s). GM DNA jumping into genomes cause ‘insertion mutagenesis’ that can lead to cancer, or activate dormant viruses that cause diseases. GM DNA often contains antibiotic resistance genes that can spread to pathogenic bacteria and make infections untreatable · Horizontal transfer and recombination of GM DNA is a main route for creating new viruses & bacteria that cause diseases”

Another Potentially Devastating GM Impact… Loss of Bees?

For several years now, scientists have been struggling to determine why bee colonies across the world are disappearing, and one theory is that it’s being caused by genetically modified crops—either as a result of the crops themselves or the pesticides and herbicides applied on them, such as the glyphosate-based herbicide Roundup. In one German study,2 when bees were released in a genetically modified rapeseed crop, then fed the pollen to younger bees, scientists discovered the bacteria in the guts of the young ones mirrored the same genetic traits as ones found in the GE crop, indicating that horizontal gene transfer had occurred.

If it is proven that GM crops are causing bee die-offs, it could turn out to be one of the worst GM effects yet. New research from Emory University researchers found that wildflowers produce one-third fewer seeds when even one bumblebee species is removed from the area.3 As bee die-offs continue, it’s clear that this could easily be one of the greatest threats to humans in the decades to come. The researchers concluded:

“Our results suggest that ongoing pollinator declines may have more serious negative implications for plant communities than is currently assumed.”

See the rest here:

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/08/06/genetic-modification.aspx?e_cid=20130811_SNL_MS_1&utm_source=snl&utm_medium=email&utm_content=ms1&utm_campaign=20130811

Monsanto Patent

Very good, short video by Jeffrey Smith explaining one important reason that Monsanto created GMO’s.  (it’s not about their myth of feeding the world…)

March Against Monsanto

This is happening May 25th all over the world. Find a march near you and let’s all get out there and stand up for our food supply!

More info at:

http://www.march-against-monsanto.com/

This is from the site, also has the FB and other links to find a march near you.

How The March Against Monsanto Can (and will) Change The World

Note: I hosted a special radio show on  5/22/13, on The Anti-Media Radio where we went into more depth on all of these fundamental building blocks of the Food Revolution which included a panel of experts from each field I listed in this article. Please listen here here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjxS7QJbmCY&feature=youtu.be
by Nick Bernabe
March Against Monsanto
How The March Against Can And Will Change The World
The March Against Monsanto was started by a handful of millenials with a passion for change, a passion that we all have within us. Many people make the mistake of looking for someone to make change for them when the real change in this world comes from within. The top-down approach for making the world a better place, i.e. electing politicians to do our bidding has come and gone, with little success. There’s a revolution happening right before our eyes, and before I had the opportunity to help with the world-wide March Against Monsanto, I was largely oblivious to this sea change that is coming. The rules of change, of activism, of consciousness, and of helping people are being rewritten by you and me, one connection at a time. The new revolution of good is coming from the grass-roots and making its way upward; this bottom-up effect is exactly what those who would like to see us silent are afraid of.
This new way of media and activism cannot be controlled by the likes of corporations or governments; these are ideas and they cannot be stopped. This new paradigm shift starts with you, your friends and family, and the way you can connect with people around you; the way information is disseminated makes all the difference in this new paradigm. The mainstream media controls 95% of the information  that we see, from television to newspapers, to magazines. This is the top-down technique, where you have no choice but to consume what’s being served, making for a fickle population that was manipulated by commercials and where money made the major difference between a bill passing or failing, and a politician being elected or losing. The new media  is a media of choice, where people can choose to get information on a topic that they choose. What does this mean? This means that a person that participates in the new media is more passionate, better informed, in turn a much more valuable asset to a social movement. These people are well versed in the information, founded in fact, and immune to the manipulation of a mainstream media establishment that is 90% owned by 6 monopolistic corporations. These new activists are warriors for truth and justice, and for those currently controlling the agenda, this can be a scary situation.
You see, the government and corporations are ingrained into the establishment; they’re comfortable in their positions. This will be their downfall. History and science have shown that the comfortable devolve and the oppressed evolve; struggle is the essence of innovation and of change. This is why good always prevails over bad. The March Against Monsanto has grown beyond my wildest dreams; a few months ago it was just an idea. It has grown into a full blown movement and the people that started it wouldn’t be able to stop if they wanted. You see, the people have taken over the March, the decentralization has come in a natural way, an intuitive way. Movements can no longer be over-centralized, as over-centralization is detrimental to any organization, institution, business and government. The new paradigm which is forming will be driven by people who care, not people who care for power. The old idea of inorganic manipulation, which used to be the norm, has fallen to the side in favor of this new movement of information: this new Revolution. Information is spreading in grass-roots, open source fashion, all the old rules are being thrown out.
How the March AgainstMonsanto can and will change the world. The beginning of the Food Revolution.
The March does not and cannot end on May 25, 2013. For many of the participants in the March Against Monsanto, this is their first protest or march that they have ever taken part of. This movement has awakened a very large group of people that care about their food supply and care about other people’s food supply. These courageous marchers have put aside all of their political and ideological differences to stand in solidarity for what is right.How do we carry on this March Against Monsanto, this new food revolution passed the 25th?

Capture the momentum of this movement and harness it at the local level. Keep your local march network alive and growing.
All of the connections that you are making in your local areas, all of the people you are meeting through the organizing, planning, and marching process must be kept active for this march to have a lasting effect. If we just march on the 25th and nothing more, then the movement ends right then and there. Each event page for each local city is full of great contacts, activists, and people that care. Compile these lists, make email lists, start a newsletter, make a local Facebook page and keep the pressure on to continue this fight. Pass around signup sheets at your local marches to collect emails. Even if you don’t have a plan of action for what to do with the emails you compile, put them into a spread sheet and save them until you figure it out. I recommend that once your march is over on Saturday evening that you change the Date of your local Facebook event to 5/24/14; this will keep the event page up and will make it easier to access your local food revolutionaries. Use open source organizing techniques to lower the burden and to keep your local movement decentralized. Using an open platform will make it easier for your local community and activists to add information into your spread sheets, email lists, and other data rich documents. Monsanto is not going away without a fight: They’ve been around for over 100 years and deeply entrenched in the political establishment of both parties.
After the March, take real steps to improve your food fate locally. Remember that people on a low or fixed income don’t have a choice to eat organic with their given incomes.
It’s not enough to simply tell people to eat organic, or vote for initiatives that will label GMOs. The very first thing you can do is plant your own garden. If you have the space, plant a garden larger than what you need to feed your family and help someone that is less fortunate with some fresh homegrown food from your garden. What if you don’t have a yard to plant in? One option is growing indoors. There is a growing industry of indoor gardeners that are starting to change the way we think about gardening through the use of

hydroponics . You should be able to find a local hydroponics store near you and get it all set up and growing food for a couple hundred dollars. There are also plenty of online retailers of indoor growing equipment; try Craigslist if you’re on a tight budget. What if you don’t have a yard and growing indoors in not an option for you? At this point we need to look to our fellow local activists from the March Against Monsanto.

Community gardens are a great way to bring in a fresh and organic food source into an urban area. Find a plot of land that is vacant or belongs to the local city, find out who is on charge of it and get the ball rolling on starting a community garden. Enlist some people that you have met though the march to help you physically, technically, and financially. Look to the local community to crowd source labor and resources. If none of these are an option for you, there’s still hope for you within the food revolution. Share cropping is a way of getting some space to grow a garden that you can secure for free or a very low cost. Many urban sharecroppers will offer free food from the garden to the land owner in exchange for offering them some space to grow a garden. Share cropping is just like a community garden on a smaller scale. If you live in an area where there are many small yards with space available, think about setting up a sharecropping co-op where food can be traded and shared for little or no money. Always remember that the low income community is at the highest risk of GMO and chemical exposure from their food. Look into new technologies and techniques when setting up your new gardens. Vertical gardeningis great way to maximize limited space a make your garden virtually maintenance free. There’s an ancient technique of hydroponics that is just being rediscovered and developed: aquaponics.

 

Aquaponics is arguably the most efficient way to grow organic vegetables…and edible fish at the same time. This technique has been around for hundreds if not thousands of years, but new attention is being brought to aquaponics because of its efficiency and ability to grow both edible fish and vegetation. A Wisconsin man was able to grow over one million pounds of food in one year by utilizing these new and innovative growing techniques.
Activism
There are many forms of activism that we can use to improve our food fate and continue the food revolution. The March Against Monsanto is a perfect example of a mass movement that disseminates information to millions of people, awakening the masses to the injustices of the world. Activism can be done on a much smaller scale and many different ways. As I detailed earlier, the networks are being rebuilt in a new, more just way. Utilize your new local network of activists to keep pressure on local politicians and hold them to their promises. Organize mass emailing and mass calling to their offices when a critical vote is about to be made. Let them hear your voice amplified by your entire network. Build relationships with other activists from other causes, reach out to other interests and help support them, and they will support you. Spreading awareness is key to the food revolution; many people don’t know what GMOs are, let alone know the negative effects on their health and environment that they cause.
Mobilize your local activist network often and keep them engaged in the community; you are the leaders of this movement! It’s up to you to let your neighbors know what’s in their food and how they can make real world progress to take their food back. These techniques can also be replicated on the national and global level, which is why it’s important for you to stay connected to the national MAM campaign. We can find and spot things like the Monsanto Protection Act before they are passed into law and put out a call to action to all the local networks to help us get them stopped.
Support alternative media
Remember seeing the warnings about the dangers of the ‘Monsanto Protection Act’ on MSNBC and FOX News before it became a law? Me neither. That’s because there was no warning from the mainstream media; in fact very few have even covered it to this day. We did find out about this bill when it was only a proposal from multiple reports by independent journalists, including SpreadLibertyNews on 12/17/12. The pattern that we see from the mainstream is a dangerous one. As I noted earlier, over 90% of the media is owned by 6 companies, and just like Monsanto, these companies have also slipped into bed with the government.
Comedians have become the only mainstream media sources that are willing to challenge the establishment’s political and economic might. Yet pundits like Jon Stewart who have been shown in polls to be more trusted for news than some major news outlets, only bring light to these harmful pieces of legislation after they are already passed into law. This is why supporting and finding alternative news sources is so important: Do you want to find out about harmful legislation before it’s passed while we still have time to mobilize and try to stop them, or do you want to find out about it on TV when it’s too late? Find and support independent journalists on sites like TheAnti-Media.org that aggregate news from many diverse sources, find the ones you like and subscribe to their posts.
The mainstream media has major interests in other industries, including military adventurism and yes you guessed it, GMOs. In a court ruling in 2003, it was determined that news companies can legally lie to their viewers and readers. The case was brought about when two FOX News journalists tried to publish a report about the negative health effects of Monsanto’s bovine growth hormone (BGH) and were subsequently fired when they refused to censor their story to fit FOX’s agenda. Supporting alternative media is key in decentralizing our supply of unbiased information and getting news from sources that do not have billion-dollar agendas, finding like-minded activists, and keeping the pressure on politicians who seek to only enrich themselves and their corporate lackeys.

Note: I hosted a special radio show on  5/22/13, on The Anti-Media Radio where we went into more depth on all of these fundamental building blocks of the Food Revolution which included a panel of experts from each field I listed in this article. Please listen here here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjxS7QJbmCY&feature=youtu.be

Monsanto’s Harvest of Fear

As Monsanto is the main supporter of the ‘no on 37’ campaign, I though it fitting to share this article about their company and their genetically engineered crops.  Please tell everyone you know if CA to vote YES on Prop 37.

Monsanto’s Harvest of Fear

Monsanto already dominates America’s food chain with its genetically modified seeds. Now it has targeted milk production. Just as frightening as the corporation’s tactics–ruthless legal battles against small farmers–is its decades-long history of toxic contamination.

An anti-Monsanto crop circle in the Philippines

No thanks: An anti-Monsanto crop circle made by farmers and volunteers in the Philippines. By Melvyn Calderon/Greenpeace HO/A.P. Images.

 

Gary Rinehart clearly remembers the summer day in 2002 when the stranger walked in and issued his threat. Rinehart was behind the counter of the Square Deal, his “old-time country store,” as he calls it, on the fading town square of Eagleville, Missouri, a tiny farm community 100 miles north of Kansas City.

The Square Deal is a fixture in Eagleville, a place where farmers and townspeople can go for lightbulbs, greeting cards, hunting gear, ice cream, aspirin, and dozens of other small items without having to drive to a big-box store in Bethany, the county seat, 15 miles down Interstate 35.

Everyone knows Rinehart, who was born and raised in the area and runs one of Eagleville’s few surviving businesses. The stranger came up to the counter and asked for him by name.

“Well, that’s me,” said Rinehart.

As Rinehart would recall, the man began verbally attacking him, saying he had proof that Rinehart had planted Monsanto’s genetically modified (G.M.) soybeans in violation of the company’s patent. Better come clean and settle with Monsanto, Rinehart says the man told him—or face the consequences.

Rinehart was incredulous, listening to the words as puzzled customers and employees looked on. Like many others in rural America, Rinehart knew of Monsanto’s fierce reputation for enforcing its patents and suing anyone who allegedly violated them. But Rinehart wasn’t a farmer. He wasn’t a seed dealer. He hadn’t planted any seeds or sold any seeds. He owned a small—a really small—country store in a town of 350 people. He was angry that somebody could just barge into the store and embarrass him in front of everyone. “It made me and my business look bad,” he says. Rinehart says he told the intruder, “You got the wrong guy.”

When the stranger persisted, Rinehart showed him the door. On the way out the man kept making threats. Rinehart says he can’t remember the exact words, but they were to the effect of: “Monsanto is big. You can’t win. We will get you. You will pay.”

Scenes like this are playing out in many parts of rural America these days as Monsanto goes after farmers, farmers’ co-ops, seed dealers—anyone it suspects may have infringed its patents of genetically modified seeds. As interviews and reams of court documents reveal, Monsanto relies on a shadowy army of private investigators and agents in the American heartland to strike fear into farm country. They fan out into fields and farm towns, where they secretly videotape and photograph farmers, store owners, and co-ops; infiltrate community meetings; and gather information from informants about farming activities. Farmers say that some Monsanto agents pretend to be surveyors. Others confront farmers on their land and try to pressure them to sign papers giving Monsanto access to their private records. Farmers call them the “seed police” and use words such as “Gestapo” and “Mafia” to describe their tactics.

When asked about these practices, Monsanto declined to comment specifically, other than to say that the company is simply protecting its patents. “Monsanto spends more than $2 million a day in research to identify, test, develop and bring to market innovative new seeds and technologies that benefit farmers,” Monsanto spokesman Darren Wallis wrote in an e-mailed letter to Vanity Fair. “One tool in protecting this investment is patenting our discoveries and, if necessary, legally defending those patents against those who might choose to infringe upon them.” Wallis said that, while the vast majority of farmers and seed dealers follow the licensing agreements, “a tiny fraction” do not, and that Monsanto is obligated to those who do abide by its rules to enforce its patent rights on those who “reap the benefits of the technology without paying for its use.” He said only a small number of cases ever go to trial.

Some compare Monsanto’s hard-line approach to Microsoft’s zealous efforts to protect its software from pirates. At least with Microsoft the buyer of a program can use it over and over again. But farmers who buy Monsanto’s seeds can’t even do that.

The Control of Nature

For centuries—millennia—farmers have saved seeds from season to season: they planted in the spring, harvested in the fall, then reclaimed and cleaned the seeds over the winter for re-planting the next spring. Monsanto has turned this ancient practice on its head.

Monsanto developed G.M. seeds that would resist its own herbicide, Roundup, offering farmers a convenient way to spray fields with weed killer without affecting crops. Monsanto then patented the seeds. For nearly all of its history the United States Patent and Trademark Office had refused to grant patents on seeds, viewing them as life-forms with too many variables to be patented. “It’s not like describing a widget,” says Joseph Mendelson III, the legal director of the Center for Food Safety, which has tracked Monsanto’s activities in rural America for years.

Indeed not. But in 1980 the U.S. Supreme Court, in a five-to-four decision, turned seeds into widgets, laying the groundwork for a handful of corporations to begin taking control of the world’s food supply. In its decision, the court extended patent law to cover “a live human-made microorganism.” In this case, the organism wasn’t even a seed. Rather, it was a Pseudomonas bacterium developed by a General Electric scientist to clean up oil spills. But the precedent was set, and Monsanto took advantage of it. Since the 1980s, Monsanto has become the world leader in genetic modification of seeds and has won 674 biotechnology patents, more than any other company, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture data.

Farmers who buy Monsanto’s patented Roundup Ready seeds are required to sign an agreement promising not to save the seed produced after each harvest for re-planting, or to sell the seed to other farmers. This means that farmers must buy new seed every year. Those increased sales, coupled with ballooning sales of its Roundup weed killer, have been a bonanza for Monsanto.

This radical departure from age-old practice has created turmoil in farm country. Some farmers don’t fully understand that they aren’t supposed to save Monsanto’s seeds for next year’s planting. Others do, but ignore the stipulation rather than throw away a perfectly usable product. Still others say that they don’t use Monsanto’s genetically modified seeds, but seeds have been blown into their fields by wind or deposited by birds. It’s certainly easy for G.M. seeds to get mixed in with traditional varieties when seeds are cleaned by commercial dealers for re-planting. The seeds look identical; only a laboratory analysis can show the difference. Even if a farmer doesn’t buy G.M. seeds and doesn’t want them on his land, it’s a safe bet he’ll get a visit from Monsanto’s seed police if crops grown from G.M. seeds are discovered in his fields.

Most Americans know Monsanto because of what it sells to put on our lawns— the ubiquitous weed killer Roundup. What they may not know is that the company now profoundly influences—and one day may virtually control—what we put on our tables. For most of its history Monsanto was a chemical giant, producing some of the most toxic substances ever created, residues from which have left us with some of the most polluted sites on earth. Yet in a little more than a decade, the company has sought to shed its polluted past and morph into something much different and more far-reaching—an “agricultural company” dedicated to making the world “a better place for future generations.” Still, more than one Web log claims to see similarities between Monsanto and the fictional company “U-North” in the movie Michael Clayton, an agribusiness giant accused in a multibillion-dollar lawsuit of selling an herbicide that causes cancer.

Read the rest here:  http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/05/monsanto200805

Read more great Pennywise Platter posts here: http://www.thenourishinggourmet.com/2012/10/pennywise-platter-thursday-104.html#more-5990

Read more great Monday Mania posts here: http://www.thehealthyhomeeconomist.com/monday-mania-1082012/

Read more, great Fat Tuesday posts here: http://realfoodforager.com/fat-tuesday-october-9-2012/

Genetic Roulette Movie Review

Genetic Roulette Movie Review  –  A Must See Documentary

Jeffrey Smith just released an incredible new documentary called Genetic Roulette: The Gamble of Our Lives.  It’s narrated by Lisa Oz (daughter of Dr. Oz) and features interviews with physicians, scientists, farmers, dieticians, chefs and educators all discussing the problems with genetically engineered foods.

Americans get sick more often then Europeans and people in other industrial countries and we’re getting sicker.  Since the mid 1990’s when Genetically Modified Organisms (Genetically Engineered Foods) when our food supply was taken over, without our knowledge or our consent.  The number of Americans suffering at least three chronic illnesses nearly doubled.  Why is this taking place?

We’ve had an epidemic increase in cancer, obesity, allergies, autism, diabetes, asthma, and intestinal disorders.  These are the same conditions that animals eating genetically engineered foods develop in the lab.  It seems like we, and our children, are the guinea pigs of the biotech industry. And contrary to what ‘industry’ states, there are NO long-term safety studies.

Genetic Roulette covers everything from the basics, What is a GMO? How are GMOs made? It also has a number of sections on the possible connection of GMOs to Allergies, Autism, Intestinal Damage and Birth Defects.

There’s also a great section on the California Ballot Initiative – Yes on Prop 37 -that with the support of millions of Californians, will hopefully win in November.

There’s a second bonus disk with three other short documentaries: Seeds of Freedom (narrated by Jeremy Irons), The Documented Health Risks of Genetically Engineered Foods, The Politics of GMOs and 12 short Public Service announcements.

If you eat food this is a must see movie. Share it with everyone you know and lets get GMOs out of our food supply.  Highly Recommended!

Here’s the link to buy the DVD:

You can watch the trailer here:

Read more, great Monday Mania posts here: http://www.thehealthyhomeeconomist.com/monday-mania-9102012/

Read more, great Fat Tuesday posts here: http://realfoodforager.com/fat-tuesday-september-11-2012/

Read more, great Real Food Wednesday posts here: http://kellythekitchenkop.com/2012/09/real-food-wednesday-952012.html

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Jeffrey Smith in San Diego

Jeffrey Smith in San Diego

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