GMO Myths and Truths

for food and feed safety than conventional plants
and organisms”. 50
But it was not the studies’ findings, nor even
the Commission’s report of those findings, but
Geoghegan-Quinn’s soundbite about the report
that found its way into the GM proponents’
statements. Closer examination of the case shows
why.
Tracing the evidence back to its source, we
examine first the report to which Geoghegan-
Quinn was referring in her quote: A Decade of
EU-Funded GMO Research. Of the fifty research
projects discussed in the report, just ten are listed
as relating to safety aspects of GM foods. 45
However, within those ten projects, there is
astonishingly little data of the type that could be
used as credible evidence regarding the safety or
harmfulness of GM foods. Such evidence would
normally consist of long-term animal feeding
studies comparing one group of animals fed a
diet containing one or more GM ingredients with
a control group fed a diet containing the same
ingredients in non-GM form. Instead, the studies
examine such topics as risk assessment of GM
foods, methods of testing for the presence and
quantity of GMOs in food and feed, and consumer
attitudes to GM foods.
This data is not relevant to assessing the safety
of any GM food. In fact, the report makes clear
that the food safety research studies were not
designed to do so – though taxpayers would be
entitled to ask why the Commission spent 200
million Euros of public money 45 on a research
project that failed to address this most pressing
of questions about GM foods. Instead, the
research studies were designed to develop “safety
assessment approaches for GM foods”. 45 One of
the published studies carried out under the project
confirms that the aim was “to develop scientific
methodologies for assessing the safety” of GM
crops. 23
Nonetheless, a few animal feeding studies
with GM foods were carried out as part of the
EU project. It is difficult to work out how many
studies were completed, what the findings were,
and how many studies passed peer review and
were published, because the authors of the EU
Commission report fail to reference specific
studies to back up their claims. Instead, they
randomly list references to a few published
studies in each chapter of the report and leave
the reader to guess which statements refer to
which studies.
In some cases it is unclear whether there is
any published data to back up the report’s claims.
For example, a 90-day feeding study on hamsters
is said to show that “the GM potato was as safe
as the non-GM potato”, but no reference is given
to any published study or other source of data, so
there is no way of verifying the claim. 45
Our own search of the literature uncovered
three published studies on GM food safety that
were carried out as part of SAFOTEST, one of the
ten food safety-related projects. Our examination
of these studies below reveals that, contrary to
the claims of GM proponents and Commissioner
Geoghegan-Quinn, they do not show the safety
of GM food but rather give cause for concern.
3.2.1. Poulsen (2007) 22
A feeding trial on rats fed GM rice found
significant differences in the GM-fed group as
compared with the control group fed the non-GM
parent line of rice. These included a markedly
higher water intake by the GM-fed group, as well
as differences in blood biochemistry, immune
response, and gut bacteria. Organ weights of
female rats fed GM rice were different from those
fed non-GM rice. Commenting on the differences,
the authors said, “None of them were considered
to be adverse”. But they added that this 90-day
study “did not enable us to conclude on the safety
of the GM food.” 22
In reality, a 90-day study is too short to show
whether any changes found are “adverse” (giving
rise to identifiable illness). Yet no regulatory body
requires GM foods to be tested for longer than this
subchronic (medium-term) period of 90 days.
The study found that the composition of the
GM rice was different from that of the non-GM
parent, in spite of the fact that the two rice lines
were grown side-by-side in identical conditions.
This is clear evidence that the GM transformation
process had disrupted gene structure and/
or function in the GM variety, making it nonsubstantially
equivalent to the non-GM line.
GMO Myths and Truths 44