More Reasons to Grow Yer Own...or...Maybe It's Too Late

Here's another fun article for "us people"....I'm beginning to think we are just plain old effed no matter what we do......

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......link for American Academy of Environmental Medicine...position statements, resources)

Charlie

Excerpts:

Doctors Warn: Avoid Genetically Modified Food By Jeffrey M. Smith

On May 19th, the American Academy of Environmental Medicine (AAEM) called on "Physicians to educate their patients, the medical community, and the public to avoid GM (genetically modified) foods when possible and provide educational materials concerning GM foods and health risks."[1] They called for a moratorium on GM foods, long-term independent studies, and labeling. AAEM's position paper stated, "Several animal studies indicate serious health risks associated with GM food," including infertility, immune problems, accelerated aging, insulin regulation, and changes in major organs and the gastrointestinal system. They conclude, "There is more than a casual association between GM foods and adverse health effects. There is causation," as defined by recognized scientific criteria. "The strength of association and consistency between GM foods and disease is confirmed in several animal studies."

More and more doctors are already prescribing GM-free diets. Dr. Amy Dean, a Michigan internal medicine specialist, and board member of AAEM says, "I strongly recommend patients eat strictly non-genetically modified foods." Ohio allergist Dr. John Boyles says "I used to test for soy allergies all the time, but now that soy is genetically engineered, it is so dangerous that I tell people never to eat it."

Dr. Jennifer Armstrong, President of AAEM, says, "Physicians are probably seeing the effects in their patients, but need to know how to ask the right questions." World renowned biologist Pushpa M. Bhargava goes one step further. After reviewing more than 600 scientific journals, he concludes that genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are a major contributor to the sharply deteriorating health of Americans.

Dangerously few studies, untraceable diseases

AAEM states, "GM foods have not been properly tested" and "pose a serious health risk." Not a single human clinical trial on GMOs has been published. A 2007 review of published scientific literature on the "potential toxic effects/health risks of GM plants" revealed "that experimental data are very scarce." The author concludes his review by asking, "Where is the scientific evidence showing that GM plants/food are toxicologically safe, as assumed by the biotechnology companies?"[28]

(note response from David Suzuki...my emphasis)

Famed Canadian geneticist David Suzuki answers, "The experiments simply haven't been done and we now have become the guinea pigs." He adds, "Anyone that says, 'Oh, we know that this is perfectly safe,' I say is either unbelievably stupid or deliberately lying."[29]

Dr. Schubert points out, "If there are problems, we will probably never know because the cause will not be traceable and many diseases take a very long time to develop." If GMOs happen to cause immediate and acute symptoms with a unique signature, perhaps then we might have a chance to trace the cause.

This is precisely what happened during a US epidemic in the late

1980s. The disease was fast acting, deadly, and caused a unique measurable change in the blood?but it still took more than four years to identify that an epidemic was even occurring. By then it had killed about 100 Americans and caused 5,000-10,000 people to fall sick or become permanently disabled. It was caused by a genetically engineered brand of a food supplement called L-tryptophan.

If other GM foods are contributing to the rise of autism, obesity, diabetes, asthma, cancer, heart disease, allergies, reproductive problems, or any other common health problem now plaguing Americans, we may never know. In fact, since animals fed GMOs had such a wide variety of problems, susceptible people may react to GM food with multiple symptoms. It is therefore telling that in the first nine years after the large scale introduction of GM crops in 1996, the incidence of people with three or more chronic diseases nearly doubled, from 7% to 13%.[30]

To help identify if GMOs are causing harm, the AAEM asks their "members, the medical community, and the independent scientific community to gather case studies potentially related to GM food consumption and health effects, begin epidemiological research to investigate the role of GM foods on human health, and conduct safe methods of determining the effect of GM foods on human health."

Citizens need not wait for the results before taking the doctors advice to avoid GM foods. People can stay away from anything with soy or corn derivatives, cottonseed and canola oil, and sugar from GM sugar beets?unless it says organic or "non-GMO." There is a pocket Non-GMO Shopping Guide, co-produced by the Institute for Responsible Technology and the Center for Food Safety, which is available as a download, as well as in natural food stores and in many doctors' offices.

If even a small percentage of people choose non-GMO brands, the food industry will likely respond as they did in Europe?by removing all GM ingredients. Thus, AAEM's non-GMO prescription may be a watershed for the US food supply.

Reply to
Charlie
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Charlie you are crazy BUT not insane.

Crazy Bill.

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Eur Rev Med Pharmacol Sci. 2009 Jan-Feb;13(1):41-50. Links

Benefits and concerns associated with biotechnology-derived foods: can additional research reduce children health risks? Cantani A. Division of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, Department of Pediatrics, University "La Sapienza", Rome, Italy. snipped-for-privacy@pelagus.it The development of techniques devised for the genetic manipulation of foods poses new risks for children with food allergy (FA). The introduction of foreign allergenic proteins from different foods into previously tolerated foods may trigger allergic reactions, often complicating with anaphylactic shock in a subset of allergic babies. Children with FA, even if subjected to preventative diets, always challenge the risk of developing allergic manifestations after unintentional intake of a non tolerated food in restaurant settings, with relatives or schoolmates, etc, where product labelling is necessarily lacking. The introduction of potentially allergenic proteins into foods generally considered safe for allergic children can be done deliberately, by either substantially altering the food ingredients, or by genetic manipulation which change the composition or transfer allergens, or unintentionally by qualitycontrol failures, due to contaminations in the production process, or to genetic mismanipulation. There is a controversy between multinationals often favored by governments and consumer association resistance, thus an equidistant analysis poses some unprecedented impediments. The importance of FA and the potential of transgenic plants to bring food allergens into the food supply should not be disregarded. The expression in soybeans of a Brazil nut protein resulted in a food allergen ex-pressed in widely used infant formulas, so paving the way to an often reported multinational debacle. Genetic engineering poses innovative ethical and social concerns, as well as serious challenges to the environment, human health, animal welfare, and the future of agriculture. In this paper will be emphasized practical concepts more crucial for pediatricians. PMID: 19364084 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE

Reply to
Bill who putters

On May 27, 4:32 am, Charlie wrote: After reviewing more than 600 scientific

Nah, the major contributor to the sharply deterioration health of Americans is putting too much grease/fat/oils on thier genetically and non genetically modified food and not exercising.

It's arrogant to think that all plants and animals somehow know what is good and bad for the human body and genetically change their structure to benefit humans (and thus conclude that only non GMO are good for you). But whatever floats your boat...

Reply to
bungalow_steve

Humans have been slowly altering the genetics of their food, to their benefit, through artificial selection since before recorded history. The problem is that people are now making alterations in an unnatural way, which results in the production of a number of previously unknown substances within the modified organisms, many of which have been proven to be harmful.

Also, we started adding all of that manufactured grease to our foods around a century ago. In recent years, awareness of this problem has been increasing, so one would assume that negative health effects from this would be decreasing overall. Of course, people don't always do what they know is best for their health.

Reply to
Mycosimian

How can it, since digesting it reduces it to the same building blocks that nonengineered foods are made from? Not that I doubt it, I'm just curious how it can happen.

Better reason to oppose GM is effects on environment once novel DNA escapes cultivation.

Reply to
Father Haskell

Nice addition, thanks.

Like it is said.....takes one to know one, eh? ;-)

Charlie

Seal -- Crazy

If all were there when we first took the pill, Then maybe, then maybe, then maybe, then maybe... Miracles will happen as we speak.

But we're never gonna survive unless... We get a little crazy. No we're never gonna survive unless... We are a little... Crazy... No no, never survive, unless we get a little... bit...

Reply to
Charlie

See Crazy Bill's contribution to this thread. Amino acids are like leggo blocks and can be assembled into a vast number of proteins. Proteins in turn can be structures (muscle, fingernails, hair) or enzymes that function like catalysts. GMO place DNA (blueprints for enzymes) from different species together in a cell. Intermediaries (m-RNA and t-RNA) between the DNA and the ribosomes in the endoplasmic riticulum (where the protein construction is carried out) from the different species didn't evolve to work together. The results may (and I emphasize, MAY) create unique proteins that didn't exist in either of the two parent species. Then it becomes problematic whether the consumer of these proteins is allergic to them. It is not a give, that all GMO crops are bad for us. Some GMOs may be just fine. The problem is we don't know which ones. Are we sure that there is a problem? See article about StarLink corn

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and reference to GMO potatoes in England
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crop news

  1. BASF Plant Science is to conduct a 5 year trial of genetically modified potatoes on a farm hear Hull. 2. However, UK Greenpeace is calling for the trials to be cancelled after obtaining results from experiments carried out by Russia¹s Institute of Nutrition which highlighted links with cancer in laboratory rats.

These two references should be enough for consumers to demand labeling and through testing of GMO products BEFORE being approved for consumption.

How about GMOs being used as fodder for animals?

As we read in Omnivore's Dilemma: "So it makes evolutionary sense that pastured meals, the nutritional profile of which closely resembles that of wild game, would be better for us. Grass-fed meat, milk, and eggs contain less total fat and less saturated fats than the same foods from grain-fed animals. Pastured animals also contain conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), a fatly acid dial. some recent studies indicate may help reduce weight and prevent cancer, and which is absent from feedlot animals. But perhaps most important, meat, eggs, and milk from pastured animals also contain higher levels of omega-3s, essential fatty acids created in the cells of green plants and algae that play an indispensable role in human health, and especially in the growth and health of neurons?brain cells. (It's important to note that fish contain higher levels of the most valuable omega-3s than land animals, yet grass-fed animals do offer significant amounts of such important omega-3s as alpha linolenic acid?ALA.) Much research into the role of omega-3s in the human diet remains to be done, but the preliminary findings are suggestive: Researchers report that pregnant women who receive supplements of omega-3s give birth to babies with higher IQs; children with diets low in omega-3s exhibit more behavioral and learning problems at school; and puppies eating diets high in omega-3s prove easier to train. (All these claims come from papers presented at a 2004 meeting of the International Society for the Study of Fatty Acids and Lipids.)"

Reply to
Billy

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