GM Foods - some bizzarre experiments

Discussions about genetically-modified or GM Foods typically make them seem quite straight foward and harmless - like combining the genes of a high-yield species of rice with another, perhaps hardier species that thrives under difficult conditions. It seems not much different from traditional cross-pollination. It even seems noble.

So why are some people, me included, so against genetic engineering to produce GM foods?

Because there is more to it. Some of the experiments being carried out are truly bizzarre. Below is a small sampling that I came across within ONE MONTH in 1994, when I was producing my natural health newsletter, The Good Life.

More Frankenfoods and Frankensteins...

Below are some examples of GM Foods experimentation by scientists, as well as examples of other attemps to produce medicine and solve illness through genetic engineering.

Remember, these were examples taken from 1994. What sort of GM Foods experiments are being carried out - and approved - today?

Fishy
Scientist in China have raised carp implanted with cattle genes, making them grow 30 percent bigger.

Newspapers report said they had originally wanted to implant human genes into the fish, but decided that cattle was “safer” and had less moral implications.

Drug relatives
A Japanese pharmaceutical company is trying to produce new drug using DNA extracted from tribes people in the Philippines. The natives are immune to tuberculosis. So scientists figured that if they could put their genes in the pills, that immunity can be transferred to anyone taking the drug.

What will this lead us to? An entirely new form of kinship! Pop a pill and you will find yourself suddenly related to someone living in a remote jungle in the Philippines.

Monkey business
In the unending war against the disease AIDS, doctors have thought up yet another bizarre “solution”.

For some unknown reason, baboons are immune to AIDS. So doctors are reportedly working on way to transplant baboon bone marrow into AIDS patient, to have them produce baboon blood.

What’s new? Doctors have already transplanted baboon heats and pig liver into humans!

Buaya
Buaya, the Malay word for crocodile, is also slang for lecherous men who try to hard too “charm” women.

Well, scientists are trying to create a different breed of buayas -- by combining crocodile blood with human blood! A science report on the BBC World Service said this might help divers to stay for longer periods under water.

But not in Europe!
The European Union has extended its ban on rBST, a genetically engineered hormone which boosts milk productions in cows. European agriculture ministers agreed (in 1994) to extend the ban until 1 Jan, 2000. Only the UK minister wanted an immediate lifting of the ban.

European ilk farmers are also not in favour of BST. A survey of 500 diary farmers by Farmers Weekly found 79 percent against the licensing of rBST.

Over in the US, approval for rBST means that milk output would increase. But milk consumption has been falling as more as people realise that milk is not healthy. In response, the diary industry has launched a massive and advertising campaign and is paying pop and movie star million of dollars to endorse milk.

2009 UPDATE:
Thankfully, good sense prevailed in most of the world. As at 2009, rBST is not approved for use in Japan, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, amongst other countries. And the European Union had turned the temporary ban on BST into a permanent ban, starting 1 January 2000.

Over in the US, where rBST is allowed, a number of supermarket chains and food establishments have stopped selling or using milk products from cows that have been given rBST.

Amongst others, the major supermarket chain Safeway stopped buying from dairy farmers that use rBST in January 2007. Coffee chain Starbucks, too, made all dairy products in its beverages rBST free in January 2008.

But while there are pockets of good sense, the madness of GM Foods continues. Click here to read another article on GM Foods and here for an index of articles on the subject of Strange Foods.

Plus, click here to read more about the rBST or rBGH -- which is actually GM Foods for cows!