Part 1 of 3
GENETIC ROULETTE: THE GAMBLE OF OUR LIVES -- ILLUSTRATED SCREENPLAYdirected by Jeffrey M. Smith
Narrated by Lisa Oz
© 2012 Institute for Responsible Technology
[Doris Rapp, M.D., Environmental Medical Specialist and Pediatric Allergist, Author] Should you be concerned? I should think you'd be scared silly. Not only for your children, but for you. Why do you think so many people are sick now? We cannot tolerate what's going on any longer. We must stand up and be counted. We must write our politicians. We must talk to the people at the store, and say, "I'm not going to buy it unless it says, 'Not Genetically Engineered.'"
-- Genetic Roulette: The World's Most Dangerous Food Scam Exposed, directed by Jeffrey M. Smith
GENETIC ROULETTE[Transcribed from the movie by Tara Carreon]
[Narrator] America: bountiful, innovative, entrepreneurial,
diverse,
progressive --
sick?
Americans get sick more often than Europeans and people in other industrialized countries. And they are getting sicker.
Since the mid-90's, the number of Americans suffering from at least three chronic illnesses nearly doubled.
And America's international ranking for infant mortality and lifespan also plunged.
There are many reasons why this is taking place.
One may be right in front of you.
GENETIC ROULETTE: THE GAMBLE OF OUR LIVES
Directed by Jeffrey M. Smith
Narrated by Lisa Oz
[Robin A. Bernhoft, M.D., Medical Director, Bernhoft Center for Advanced Medicine] Over the past 20 years, there has been enormous logarithmic increase ...
in a whole series of chronic illnesses.
[Don Huber, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Plant Pathology, Purdue University] Things we're seeing today aren't normal. We didn't see them 30 years ago, or 50 years ago.
[Doris Rapp, M.D., Environmental Medical Specialist and Pediatric Allergist, Author] Illnesses that weren't epidemic before are now epidemic, and at a scale that is just monumental.
[Jeffrey M. Smith] People are getting sicker. What's changed?
Well, one thing that has changed is the food.
And the most radical change is the genetic engineering of our food supply.
[Ashley Koff, R.D., Celebrity Dietician, Author of Mom Energy] We have gone from food
in its whole-food form,
to food undergoing a scientific experiment.
88% OF U.S. CORN IS GENETICALLY MODIFIED
94% OF U.S. SOY IS GENETICALLY MODIFIED
[Dennis Kucinich, U.S. Congressman, Former Presidential Candidate] We have hundreds of millions of acres of genetically modified crops have been planted in the United States. And yet most people are not aware.
[Woman] The normal consumer, unfortunately,
especially these days,
is just busy trying to hold on to their house,
or put their kids through school.
And they are not aware of anything being genetically modified.
[David Bronner, President, Dr. Bronner's Magic Soaps] Obama's USDA is owned by the biotech, just as much as every previous administration.
And if we don't do anything, like within a decade, every single major crop with any significant market size, is going to be genetically modified. And we're not going to know it.
WHAT IS A GMO?GMO: Genetically Modified Organisms.
[Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] They take genes from one species and force it into the DNA of other species. And they can mix and match between species that have never normally mated.
So they have spider genes that they put into goats, in the hopes that they can milk the goat
to get spider-web protein to make bullet-proof vests. I'm not making this up.
They've taken cow genes and put them into pigs so that the pigs have cow hides.
They've taken human genes and put them into corn to make spermicide. And for the food we eat, there are two main categories:
(1) the herbicide-tolerant crops:
they can spray them with herbicide
and not kill them, or (2) the pesticide-producing crops
that produce their own toxic insecticide, that if a bug bites those plants, it breaks open the stomach
and kills them.
So they are completely swapping genes between the normal species barriers, creating new organisms that were not part of the evolutionary process. HOW ARE GMOS MADE? [Robin A. Bernhoft, M.D., Medical Director, Bernhoft Center for Advanced Medicine] The general public has the impression that genetic engineering is somehow a precise science. More accurately, it's submicroscopic shooting from the hip.
[Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] The very process of genetic engineering creates unpredicted side effects. You take a gene and make millions of copies.
And they put them in a gun, literally. And then shoot that gun into a plate of millions of cells.
And then you clone those cells
into a plant.
[Arden Anderson, Ph.D., D.O., M.P.H., Author of Real Medicine, Real Health]
Typically, what they will put onto that, is a virus, or a part of a virus, in order to turn that gene on. [Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology]
Now the process of insertion, plus cloning, creates massive collateral damage.
There can be hundreds, or thousands of mutations up and down the DNA. And hundreds, or thousands of genes, can change their levels of expression in the naturally functioning plant. This creates unpredicted side effects.
[Arden Anderson, Ph.D., D.O., M.P.H., Author of Real Medicine, Real Health]
From a biophysics perspective, when we look at the signature now of that entire gene sequence, it's foreign. It does not exist anywhere in nature. And therefore, our immune system, which is truly a grand, electromagnetic sensor system, looks at that material, that gene sequence, that is supposed to be food, whether it's soy, or corn, or whatever it might be, looks at that and says, "I've never seen that sequence ever." It doesn't exist in nature. It's foreign. It attacks. It creates an inflammatory reaction, and attacks that sequence. [Martha Grout, M.D., Medical Director of The Arizona Center for Advanced Medicine] Many of the diseases that we deal with, in fact, most of the diseases that we deal with,
have, as a source, inflammation.
[The Fires Within: Inflammation is the Body's First Defense Against Infection, But When It Goes Awry, It Can Lead to Heart Attacks, Colon Cancer, Alzheimer's and a Host of Other Diseases, by Christine Gorman and Alice Park]
Many of them, the source is inflammation in the gut,
which is, of course, the first interface between the body and any kind of food, including GMO food. [Narrator] In 1996, genetically engineered corn and soy were introduced into the American diet.
Since then, numerous digestive disorders related to gut inflammation have been on the rise in the U.S. population. Is this just a coincidence?
But inflammation creates additional serious disorders unrelated to digestion. [Martha Grout, M.D., Medical Director of The Arizona Center for Advanced Medicine] So I think we should probably look at allergies. I'm sure we should look at auto-immune diseases. And you know, basically, anything that's related to inflammation:
heart disease, kidney disease, diabetes. I mean, it doesn't stop. Thyroid disease.
HOW GMOs CAME TO YOUR TABLE [Michael Taylor, Deputy Commissioner for Foods, FDA] Protecting the food supply, making it safe, making it nutritious, is one of the most fundamental duties of government, and then of course of FDA. When you think about the importance of food to public health, to the health of people, there is really nothing more fundamental.
[Statement of Policy: Foods Derived from New Plant Varieties: Biotechnology Guidance Documents, by U.S. Food and Drug Administration]
[Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] The current FDA policy on GMOs, created in 1992,
says that the agency is not aware of any information showing that GMOs are significantly different; therefore, no safety studies are necessary.
[Landmark Lawsuit Challenges FDA Policy on Genetically Engineered Foods, by Center for Food Safety]
It turns out that in 1998, a lawsuit forced 44,000 secret internal memos into the public domain, and they showed a different story.
[Steven M. Druker, Public Interest Attorney, Initiator of FDA lawsuit] As I combed through those 44,000 pages of memoranda and other documents, I was shocked,
because it became clear that
the FDA had been lying repeatedly since 1992. Because they claimed that there was an overwhelming consensus within the scientific community that these foods were safe. But the overwhelming consensus within their own scientific staff was exactly opposite. These foods could not be presumed safe. [Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] The overwhelming consensus among the scientists working at the FDA were not only that GMOs were different,
but that they were dangerous. They could lead to allergies, toxins, new diseases, and nutritional problems, they said over and over in their memos. They urged their superiors to require long term studies, but were ignored. Why?
[Trouble in the Garden: More Bad News for Monsanto & Biotech, by Peter Montague]
The person in charge of policy at the FDA was Michael Taylor, Monsanto's former attorney, later Monsanto's Vice-President, now back at the FDA as U.S. food safety czar.
[Steven M. Druker, Public Interest Attorney, Initiator of FDA lawsuit]
What Monsanto and the biotech industry wanted from the FDA,
was a policy that created the illusion that genetically engineered foods were being diligently regulated, but that in fact imposed no burdens at all; that in fact had zero regulation. And the FDA has pulled that off masterfully.
[Stage Set for "Biotech" Debut at Grocery Store: U.S. Policy to Be Unveiled Today Regulates Food Created by Genetic Engineering Like Other Varieties, by Marlene Cimons and Donna K.H. Walters]
[Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology]
And so the FDA has not approved any genetically modified crops. There's a voluntary consultation process where companies like Monsanto can produce whatever science it wants. If the FDA asks for further information, they are typically ignored.
At the end of this meaningless exercise, the FDA produces a letter which reminds Monsanto that it's its responsibility to determine if the foods are safe.[Biotechnology Consultation Agency Response Letter BNF No. 000035, by Alan M. Rulis, Ph.D.]
So the same company, Monsanto, who told us that PCBs, Agent Orange,
and DDT were safe, and lied,
can tell us if GMOs are safe. In fact, they don't even have to tell us. They can put it on the market without telling the FDA or the consumers.
[DDT -- WEAPON AGAINST DISEASE]
["DDT IS GOOD FOR ME-E-E!"]
[Steven M. Druker, Public Interest Attorney, Initiator of FDA lawsuit, Author of Altered Genes, Twisted Truth] If they have been creating the kinds of problems that the FDA scientists warned that there could be,
that the various scientists in our lawsuit warned about,
that the expert panel of the Royal Society of Canada has warned about,
that the British Medical Association has warned about,
that scores and scores of other scientific experts
have warned about,
then
there already could have been major damage created to the health of every American, and to the health of coming generations.[Declaration of Philip J. Regal, Ph.D., Alliance for Bio-Integrity, et al. v. Donna Shalala, et al.]
[Elements of Precaution: Recommendations for the Regulation of Food Biotechnology in Canada, by The Royal Society of Canada]
[The Impact of Genetic Modification on Agriculture, Food and Health: An Interim Statement, by British Medical Association]
[Doctors' Call for Ban on GM Crops Rejected, by BBC News]
[British Medical Association Statement on GM Foods, by CropBiotech Net]
[Nick Pasco, Owner, Bear Foods Natural Market] The FDA, the USDA, and the EPA, are all responsible for different aspects of our food production. And they are signing off on this in a way that is, I mean, it is beyond outrageous.
They've appointed known advocates of GMO food to positions like Secretary of Agriculture, Food Czar, important positions in which independent decision-making should be done.
And appointing people that work for the main offender on this to those positions is insane.
Biotech Industry / People / Government
Leading GM Advocate: "Governor of the Year 2001, Biotechnology Industry Association / Thomas Vilsack / U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, 2009 (Obama)
Former Monsanto Attorney and Vice President / Michael Taylor / FDA Deputy Commissioner, 1991 & 2010 (Bush, Obama)
Director, Danforth Center (Monsanto) / Roger Beachy / Director, USDA NIFA, 2009 (Obama)
Board of Directors, Monsanto Subsidiary / Ann Veneman / U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, 2001 (Bush)
Monsanto Scientist on Bovine Growth Hormone / Margaret Miller / FDA Branch Chief that Evaluated rBGH, 1989 (Bush)
V.P., Government & Public Affairs, Monsanto / Linda Fisher / EPA Deputy Administrator, 2001 (Clinton)
[Lawrence Plumlee, M.D., Former Medical Science Advisor, EPA Office of Research and Development] I think this is the most alarming thing that I have seen in Washington, that we would clear new, unique products for human consumption, without careful independent testing of these products. I can only think that money is the reason.
[Robin A. Bernhoft, M.D., Medical Director, Bernhoft Center for Advanced Medicine] The American Academy of Environmental Medicine took a very strong position against GMO, because such research as has been done is very disturbing.
[Genetically Modified Foods Position Paper, by Amy Dean, D.O. and Jennifer Armstrong, M.D.]
[Narrator]
The American Academy cited animal studies showing infertility, immune problems, accelerated aging, complications with cholesterol and insulin, and changes in the liver, kidney, spleen, and gastrointestinal system. [Steven M. Druker, Public Interest Attorney, Initiator of FDA lawsuit, Author of Altered Genes, Twisted Truth] And unfortunately, the American consumer,
for 20 years now, has been consuming the foods
that the FDA scientists said should not be on the market
until they are proven safe. Because the FDA continues to lie about the truth.
[Tom Newmark, Founder of Sacred Seeds] When you have the power to manipulate the entire structure of evolution, it would be irresponsible for any scientist, no matter how wise, or nobel laureate, or otherwise, to take that power, and to use it without a full appreciation of its consequences.
[Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology]
The biotech companies do their own research. I call it "tobacco science." They use the wrong control group, the wrong detection method, the wrong statistics. And their feeding trials are so short they could never identify things like cancer, or reproductive disorders, or birth defects. They've got bad science down to a science. [Tom Newmark, Founder of Sacred Seeds]
No one has the right to play dice, to play roulette, with the entire genetic integrity of life on the planet. INSECTICIDE IN FOOD [Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] There's a soil bacterium called "bacillus thuringiensis," or "Bt."
And if you take that bacteria, and gather it up and use it as a spray, the Bt toxin produced by the bacteria will kill insects.
So engineers take the gene that produces the toxin, and insert it into corn and cotton, and allow the plants to do the killing.
[Elaine Ingham, Ph.D., Chief Scientist, Rodale Institute]
Every single cell within that plant is producing a toxic protein. [Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] Bt is designed to break open the stomach of insects and kill them. So when the doctors hear about this, that Bt corn was introduced into our diet in the mid-90's, they say this may explain the increase in gastro-intestinal problems that they are seeing in their practice.
But the EPA says, "Don't worry about Bt toxin, it's completely harmless to human beings and animals,
because it only affects insects."
[Bacillus Thuringiensis, by Extension Toxicology Network]
[1. PRODUCT CHARACTERIZATION AND HUMAN HEALTH ASSESSMENT
This section provides information on the specific transformation systems that were used for each product, the characterization of the DNA insert, the inheritance and stability characteristics of the product line, and the protein characterization and levels of Bt protein expression for the various plant tissues. Specific information and data for each of the registrations seeking renewal are included in tabular and descriptive formats.
The health effects assessment confirms EPA's original findings that there are no unreasonable adverse health effects from these products. The human health assessment for the Bt plant-incorporated protectants draws heavily on the science and toxicology of proteins. All the currently registered Bt plant-incorporated protectants are proteins. The source bacterium has been a registered microbial pesticide which has been approved for use on food crops. The Bt proteins approved for use in food are expected to behave as would be expected of a dietary protein. The Bt microbial pesticides have a long history of safe use without adverse health or environmental effects. Several ...]
[Crucial Paper 27: BT Proteins Are Toxic To Human Cells: Cytotoxicity on Human Cells of Cry1Ab and Cry1Ac Bt Insecticidal Toxins Alone or With a Glyphosate-Based Herbicide, by Mesnage R., Clair E., Gress S., Then C., Szekacs A., Seralini G.]
However, a study that came out in February, 2012 shows that the EPA got it wrong. [BT Toxin Kills Human Kidney Cells: Cry1Ab Biopesticide Kills Human Cells at Low Doses as Does Roundup Herbicide, by Dr. Eva Sirinathsinghji]
It does break open little pores in human cells, and it might cause the same kind of disruption in our guts as it's causing in the insects that it kills. [Garry Gordon, M.D., D.O., Author of The Chelation Answer]
If Bacillus thuringiensis is causing an increased propensity for our intestine to become permeable, or leaky, and for foods to be presented to our bloodstream in a premature fashion,
the havoc that it will cause will be across the entire spectrum of disease, from premature aging and alzheimer's, to parkinson's, to autism, to cancer, to asthma. There is no part of the spectrum [that is not affected]. Because if we start, the same as if you buy a brand new car, and it says on that that it's meant to run on gas, and you go put diesel in it, you can expect it won't go very far. So when you put the wrong fuel into your body, and by making your intestine leaky, we are permitting building blocks to go into our body that are "the wrong fuel." They have not been adequately prepared by our digestive processes, and by the simple fact
that the healthy flora in our body converts our food to active things. Like the right form of Vitamin K is only elaborated in your body. Many of the foods that we eat are not in their active form until the healthy flora begins to work on them. And disrupting that flora is why we see so much of the eczema,
so much of the asthma, so much of the allergies in our population.
[Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology]
There's only been one human feeding study on genetically modified foods, and they found that part of the gene inserted into soybeans, that make the soybeans Roundup Ready, transferred into the DNA of bacteria living inside our intestines, and stayed there. Furthermore, that bacteria was not killable with Roundup, suggesting that the gene remained active. This means that long after we stop eating genetically modified foods, we may still have these genetically modified proteins produced continuously inside of us.
They never checked to see if the Bt toxin gene, transferred from, say, corn chips, into our gut bacteria,
continued to function.
If it does, it might turn our intestinal flora into living pesticide factories.
This might explain why 93% of pregnant women tested in Canada
had the Bt toxin in their blood
as well as in the blood of 80% of their unborn fetuses.[GMO Toxins Are in Nearly All Pregnant Women & Fetuses, by Heidi Stevenson]
[Toxic Pesticides from GM Food Crops Found in Unborn Babies, by Andy Bloxham]
The authors of the study suggested that the Bt toxin came as a result of eating the milk and meat of animals that ate Monsanto's Bt corn. But I think a more plausible explanation is that the Bt toxin was produced continuously inside their own digestive tract. INTESTINAL DAMAGE [Myrto Ashe, M.D., M.P.H., Family Practitioner] What's happening in the research article that I'm reading is that
a lot of the conditions that seem to be on the rise are connected to intestinal permeability. To me, I think that this is actually one of the important parts of why GMOs might be harmful.
[Possible Links Between Intestinal Permeability and Food Processing: A Potential Therapeutic Niche for Glutamine, by Jean Robert Rapin and Nicolas Wiernsperger]
[Michelle Perro, M.D., Named one of "America's Top Pediatricians"] One of the things that really I see a lot in children now, is that kids come in with leaky guts. They are usually, in an intestine there should be tight junctions in the intestine.
But these kids are coming in, their guts are not in these tight junctions.
The foods they are eating
are leaking into their bloodstream.
They are creating an antibody response to those foods. And so they are coming in with food intolerances,
and food allergies.
[Myrto Ashe, M.D., M.P.H., Family Practitioner]
Once intestinal permeability rises, then it's possible for larger bits of food to go through, bits that really should have been digested fully before getting assimilated. Once these go into the bloodstream, the body develops a reaction to them. And this reaction is an allergic reaction. ALLERGIES [Maria Mills, Founder, Monkey Sea Monkey Doo] I have a son who has severe food allergies. And he got the food allergies back in '09, August 25, 2009, to be exact.
And I have literally, from that day forward,
been on a mission trying to figure out how did my son get these food allergies. I found out that our food supply is genetically modified. And guess what? The food that my son ate on August 25, 2009 was raw corn, the corn that almost killed him.
All I could hear him go was like, "ucchh, ucchh, ucchh,"
and like itching [his neck]. And I'm like, "What the heck is going on?" And he turned red. He couldn't breathe properly. I was in panic. I called 911. I was just like, "I think my son is having a food allergy attack."
And I immediately took him to the doctors. And I got all of these tests done. And sure enough, he's deadly allergic to corn now.
[Gary Hoyer, Chef and Educator] 25, 30, 35 years ago, no one was allergic to anything. And now you have allergies. I have people with black pepper [allergies]. They couldn't have black pepper today. There's celiacs who have wheat and gluten allergies. People who have allergies to, of course, you know, the basics, like dairy and seafood. But everything.
I have people who are allergic to parsley,
and just regular, natural, chlorophyll plants.
[Woman] We're talking about food that's become harmful.
How did that happen?
So when you link it to the GMO issue,
it resonates like you would not believe.
[John Boyle, M.D., Allergist, Immunologist] Patients with allergies, I try to keep them away from GMO foods, because they will react to them. And they'll tell you that.
[Robyn O'Brien, Founder, Allergy Kids Foundation, Author of The Unhealthy Truth] It's my fourth child who has food allergies. We have no family history of this. I knew I had taken care of myself through every pregnancy the exact same way. And as friends kept saying, "What did you do differently? What did you do differently?" I had no answer. And suddenly, in learning of this relationship between GMOs and food allergies, I finally had my answer. And in learning about genetically modified foods, I was also able to do something about it. And literally, within a 24-hour period, we cleaned out the entire kitchen. The items that we had been feeding our children for the last six years, we just literally threw into the trash.
And so at first where I was excited, and I was relieved at having discovered all of this, I then went through a really hard stage where I just cried. Because I thought, "What have I done to my children? And what has been done to them without my consent?"
[Michelle Perro, M.D., Named one of "America's Top Pediatricians"] And I have kids that are allergic to every food group. How is that possible? And not just a few of them, but quite a few of them. It's almost impossible to manage. Moms are coming in and saying, "What do I feed my kid?"
[Ashley Koff, R.D., Celebrity Dietician, Author of Mom Energy] I have seen first hand, exponential growth in allergies. And yet, when I improve the quality of my patients' diets, meaning, prescribing a non-GMO diet, prescribing organic food, their symptoms go away.
[Emily Lindner, M.D., Internal Medicine Specialist] In most of my patients, because they have some sort of immune or inflammatory response to the GMO foods, I have to take them off the non-GMO foods that are related. So I have to take them off of all corn. I have to take them off of all grains.
Because my experience is that once the immune system has been inspired to have a response, that they react to GMO and non-GMO. [Ashley Koff, R.D., Celebrity Dietician, Author of Mom Energy] You know, I had a healthy patient come in, a 30-year-old woman, who told me now when she eats any food, her skin literally overheats. Literally, anything that she is eating is causing a problem in her skin. And she says to me, "What could this be?" Well, what we do is we take her off of all of the food that she is eating, and she starts back, adding in highest quality organic foods in their base forms, right? As she is doing that, she suddenly is getting better. You know, we might have to use enzymes, or other things to help her. But if she starts to get better, guess what?
When we add back in corn or soy, she can consume it if it's not genetically modified.
AUTISM [Michelle Perro, M.D., Named one of "America's Top Pediatricians"] I'm concerned about all the health issues that I'm seeing. But the one that I am most alarmed about is
autistic spectrum, which has literally skyrocketed.
[New CDC Numbers: Autism Rates Continue to Skyrocket, by Richard Moore]
[CDC Estimates 1 in 88 Children in United States Has Been Identified As Having an Autism Spectrum Disorder, by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention]
[Autism's Mysterious Rise, by Paige Blankenbuehler]
[Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] We can't say for sure that GMOs have anything to do with autism,
but we can't say for sure that it doesn't.
In fact, there's been an increase in autism since GMOs were introduced.
And animals that eat GMOs, both in laboratory and in livestock situations, have shown some telltale signs that some practitioners say are linked with autism.
[Inside the Autistic Mind, by Claudia Wallis]
[Don Huber, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Plant Pathology, Purdue University] Studies with pigs showed the allergy response
from the GMO food reproduced all of the physiological changes that we see in the intestine,
the inflammatory response in the stomach to those foreign proteins, that we see with autistic children.
When I reported this in a symposium in Germany, a doctor that has spent his entire career working with autistic children, he came up and asked me a few questions. When I reported exactly what we were seeing symptom-wise, behavior-wise, with the rats and with the pigs, and with the cattle that are being fed GMO vs. non-GMO,
he said, "That's exactly what we're finding in our autistic children."
And why, when I can modify the diet of an autistic child ten years ago, and have a very excellent response, and remediation and recovery, why am I not getting that response now? Because we're no longer able to change that microflora back,
because we are continuing to feed our GMO-contaminated food to our children.
[Gastrointestinal Problems Common in Children With Autism, by American Academy of Pediatrics]
[Autism and the Diet Connection, by Susan Moffitt]
[Typical American Diet May Fuel Autism, by Deborah Mitchell]
[Michael Williamson, M.D., Oncologist, Hematologist, Autism Patient Consultant] Our son is 9-1/2, and he was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder about six years ago. And we've used many interventions in his therapy. But about two years ago, we learned about GMO foods, and the potential harm of this kind of food in ourselves and in our son. And particularly in the last two years we've seen some nice improvements, in combination with other things. That keep cleaning up his diet with non-GMO foods has been a big success for us.
[Laura Hirsch, Mother of Autistic Child] I just always felt there had to be a connection to autism, and all the gut-related problems that our kids have.
My son, in particular, always had GI problems:
fungal infections, and parasites, bacteria, viruses in his GI tract, that we have been treating over the years.
But not until we took GMO completely out of his diet,
did I see the biggest change in him, behaviorally especially.
[Curt Linderman, Sr., Radio Show Host and Owner of Box Organix] My son is 10 years old now. He's autistic.
And about five years ago we learned at an autism conference about GMOs. And we just decided immediately that that was one of the things that we were going to have to change about his diet. And when we did, the change was quite profound. He had a lot of gut issues, as do most children with autism. And we noticed immediately a relief in the symptoms of the bloating. And the horrible bowel movements seemed to subside substantially. And now his gut is like a normal typical kid. It's really amazing.
And we haven't done much to his gut other than get him on an organic diet, and get him away from the GMOs.
[Narrator]
The vast majority of genetically modified crops
are engineered to make it easier for farmers to kill weeds. For example, Monsanto's Roundup-ready crops,
which comprise most of today's GMOs, can survive applications of
Monsanto's best-selling weed killer, Roundup.
By 1933, the SS numbered 52,000 members. Strict membership requirements ensured that all members were of Hitler's Aryan Herrenvolk ("Aryan master race"). Applicants were vetted for Nordic qualities—in Himmler's words, "like a nursery gardener trying to reproduce a good old strain which has been adulterated and debased; we started from the principles of plant selection and then proceeded quite unashamedly to weed out the men whom we did not think we could use for the build-up of the SS."
-- Heinrich Himmler, by Wikipedia
ROUNDUP [Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] The active ingredient of Roundup is called glyphosate.
It was patented as an herbicide by Monsanto in 1974.
But 10 years earlier, it was patented as a broad-spectrum chelator.
Now chelation is the molecular level of hugging, and not letting go.
The way that it kills weeds is that it makes the nutrients unavailable to the plant. So it weakens the defenses of the plant.
And it promotes the diseases in the soil which end up killing the plant.
Now this means that plants treated with Roundup have a reduction in available nutrients. They are weak, and they are sick.
The animals that eat the nutrient-deficient plants,
they become nutrient-deficient, and weak and sick.
Then we eat the animals
and the plants that are nutrient deficient, and we may become weak and sick.
In addition, the residues of the Roundup in the plant can end up in our bodies where they can chelate -- hug -- some of the nutrients that are in our bodies, making them less available as well. Latta Ramesh, 38, drank insecticide after her crops failed -- two years after her husband disappeared when the GM debts became too much.
She left her ten-year-old son, Rashan, in the care of relatives. 'He cries when he thinks of his mother,' said the dead woman's aunt, sitting listlessly in shade near the fields.
Village after village, families told how they had fallen into debt after being persuaded to buy GM seeds instead of traditional cotton seeds.
The price difference is staggering: £10 for 100 grams of GM seed, compared with less than £10 for 1,000 times more traditional seeds.
But GM salesmen and government officials had promised farmers that these were 'magic seeds' -- with better crops that would be free from parasites and insects.
Indeed, in a bid to promote the uptake of GM seeds, traditional varieties were banned from many government seed banks.
The authorities had a vested interest in promoting this new biotechnology. Desperate to escape the grinding poverty of the post-independence years, the Indian government had agreed to allow new bio-tech giants, such as the U.S. market-leader Monsanto, to sell their new seed creations.
In return for allowing western companies access to the second most populated country in the world, with more than one billion people, India was granted International Monetary Fund loans in the Eighties and Nineties, helping to launch an economic revolution.
But while cities such as Mumbai and Delhi have boomed, the farmers' lives have slid back into the dark ages.
Though areas of India planted with GM seeds have doubled in two years -- up to 17 million acres -- many farmers have found there is a terrible price to be paid.
Far from being 'magic seeds', GM pest-proof 'breeds' of cotton have been devastated by bollworms, a voracious parasite.
Nor were the farmers told that these seeds require double the amount of water. This has proved a matter of life and death.
With rains failing for the past two years, many GM crops have simply withered and died, leaving the farmers with crippling debts and no means of paying them off.-- The GM genocide: Thousands of Indian farmers are committing suicide after using genetically modified crops, by Andrew Malone
[Bob Streit, M.S., Consulting Agronomist] In areas, very often right to the row specifically where the glyphosate was applied,
those plants are getting sicker earlier.
Tissue tests are documenting deficiencies in manganese, copper and zinc. As a result, the food is less nutritious. It's showing up in the animals, and glyphosate use is doing it. And it's working its way right up the food chain.
[Glyphosate Effects on Diseases of Plants, by G.S. Johal, D.M. Huber]
[Don Huber, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Plant Pathology, Purdue University]
Those deficiencies are very well documented
as being factors in animal diseases, as well as in human diseases.[Scientists Trace Diseases and Ailments to Mineral Deficiency, by yourdiyhealth.com]
You really need a balance of all the nutrition, all the nutrients, to keep this physical body really functioning in all the areas. Because all of them are mutually supportive and interdependent.
[Dan Skow, D.V.M., Veterinarian, Agricultural Consultant]
Basically, if you had one trace mineral, and you were looking at a specific disease, you would see an animal survive and respond to treatment. This type of thing. If you've got two trace minerals that were deficient, you had a more virulent, in other words, a more aggressive disease pattern, even with the same, identical disease.
And when you got to the three elements that were severely deficient, then things really got serious, to the point that they probably wouldn't respond to treatment. And we'd have a very, very high death loss. [Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] What do livestock in the United States eat? Roundup ready crops:
Roundup ready soy, corn, cotton seed, canola meal, sugar beet pulp,
and now alfalfa.
The bulk of their diet is Roundup ready crops.
And those crops are nutrient deficient, and have high concentrations of Roundup.
BIRTH DEFECTS [Arden Anderson, Ph.D., D.O., M.P.H., Author of Real Medicine, Real Health] The glyphosate problem has a number of issues for us.
[Roundup and Birth Defects: Is the Public Being Kept in the Dark?, by Michael Antoniou, Mohamed Ezz El-Din Mostafa Habib, C. Vyvyan Howard, Richard C. Jennings, Carlo Leifert, Rubens Onofre Nodari, Claire Robinson, John Fagan]
And one of the very sad side effects of glyphosate are birth defects. In the towns where people were workers on the farms, particularly the soybean farms,
we had as much as 70 times increase in the number of birth defects in these sprayed areas. [Monsanto's Toxic Herbicide Glyphosate: A Review of its Health and Environmental Effects, by Andre Leu]
And in fact, research of looking at studies around the world
show that
glyphosate is in fact geno-toxic,
which means it does directly cause birth defects.[Weed-Whacking Herbicide Proves Deadly to Human Cells: Used in Gardens, Farms, and Parks Around the World, the Weed Killer Roundup Contains an Ingredient That Can Suffocate Human Cells in a Laboratory, Researchers Say, by Crystal Gammon]
[Death by Multiple Poisoning, Glyphosate and Roundup, by Dr. Mae-Wan Ho and Brett Cherry]
And that doesn't necessarily mean exposure directly to the body, in other words the person was under the sprayer and got sprayed.
So exposure can also be ingestion, because that is an exposure of the body to glyphosate. [Jeffrey M. Smith, Founder, Institute for Responsible Technology] Lab animals fed Roundup Ready soy have had serious reproductive disorders.
In mice, the testicles change, including damage to the young sperm cells. In rats, there were changes in the uterus and ovaries. The DNA function differently in the embryo offspring of mice.
[Ultrastructural Analysis of Testes From Mice Fed on Genetically Modified Soybean, by L. Vecchio, B. Cisterna, M. Malatesta, T.E. Martin, M. Biggiogera]
When female rats were fed genetically modified soy, more than half of their babies died within three weeks.
The babies were also smaller, and could not reproduce. [Monsanto's Best-Selling Herbicide Roundup Linked to Infertility, by Andre Evans]
When mice were fed genetically modified Roundup ready and Bt corn,
they had fewer babies, and smaller babies.
[A glyphosate-based herbicide induces necrosis and apoptosis in mature rat testicular cells in vitro, and testosterone decrease at lower levels."
by Clair E, Mesnage R, Travert C, Séralini GÉ.
Toxicol In Vitro. 2012 Mar;26(2):269-79. doi: 10.1016/j.tiv.2011.12.009. Epub 2011 Dec 19.
Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Abstract
The major herbicide used worldwide, Roundup, is a glyphosate-based pesticide with adjuvants. Glyphosate, its active ingredient in plants and its main metabolite (AMPA) are among the first contaminants of surface waters. Roundup is being used increasingly in particular on genetically modified plants grown for food and feed that contain its residues. Here we tested glyphosate and its formulation on mature rat fresh testicular cells from 1 to 10000ppm, thus from the range in some human urine and in environment to agricultural levels. We show that from 1 to 48h of Roundup exposure Leydig cells are damaged. Within 24-48h this formulation is also toxic on the other cells, mainly by necrosis, by contrast to glyphosate alone which is essentially toxic on Sertoli cells. Later, it also induces apoptosis at higher doses in germ cells and in Sertoli/germ cells co-cultures. At lower non toxic concentrations of Roundup and glyphosate (1ppm), the main endocrine disruption is a testosterone decrease by 35%. The pesticide has thus an endocrine impact at very low environmental doses, but only a high contamination appears to provoke an acute rat testicular toxicity. This does not anticipate the chronic toxicity which is insufficiently tested, and only with glyphosate in regulatory tests.]
Preliminary evidence that's not yet published can be even worse.
In rats, the testicles changed from pink to blue.
In hamsters, by the third generation, most lost the ability to have babies.
Some had hair growing in their mouths.
[A New Example of Ectopia: Oral Hair in Some Rodent Species, by A.S. Baranov, O.F. Chernova, N. Yu. Feoktistova, and A.V. Surov]
This is astounding research.
[Reproductive Toxicity: Glyphosate, by Right Diagnosis]
And yet it's never followed up. Typically, the industry distorts or denies the findings, pretending that there's no problem.
[Don Huber, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of Plant Pathology, Purdue University] Where we used to have one fertility clinic for people, we now have an average of 14.
[Dan Skow, D.V.M., Veterinarian, Agricultural Consultant] In our community where I live,
within 100 miles of my house, there are 50 infertility clinics.
20 years ago there probably wasn't any.
[Infertility Resources: All Your Fertility Help In One Place, by ihr.com fertility websites]
One of the ladies in our local community, who works in a hairdressing shop where the ladies get to talking and this type of thing, anyway they just accept the fact that to bring forth one healthy baby they may have one, two, three, four miscarriages before they finally have one that takes. So what does that all mean long term? I don't know.
It's scary. We just know that fertility is declining.
[U.S. Fertility in Decline, by Mary Mederios Kent]
There may be other reasons. I don't know the answer to that.
[U.S. Birth Rate Hits All-Time Low, by usgovinfo.about.com]
[BEEF-CATTLE
Beef-Cattle.com
Beef Cattle Information & Resources
Beef Cattle Infertility
Beef cattle infertility is a very serious problem in beef cattle industry. Infertility and abortion lead to heavy losses in cattle production. There are many causes that may lead to infertility in animals and many a times it may be difficult to identify the underlying reasons for the same. Abortion may happen to due to some infections and cattle having abortions must be separated from the rest of the herd to prevent the spread of infections.
Bovine brucellosis or Bang's disease is one of the leading causes of beef cattle infertility. It affects the udder, uterus, lymph nodes, testicles and accessory sex glands. The bacterium Brucella abortus causes this disease. Symptoms in cows include abortion, reduced weight gain and reduced milk production. Epididymitis in bulls indicates bang's disease. Healthy animals coming in contact with infectious animals can easily catch the disease causing bacteria, especially from aborted fetuses, placental membranes, placental fluids and the vaginal discharges. The fluids and discharges remain infected with bacteria for many days, even after the abortion. Also potential dangers are the milk and colostrums from infected animals. Even humans consuming them are at risk. Once infected the cows may have reduced fertility and may not give birth to healthy calves even later in their life.]
But in the livestock world, we definitely know that there is a decline.
[Reproductive Loss in High-Producing Dairy Cattle: Where Will It End?
M.C. Lucy
Department of Animal Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia 65211
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3168/jds.S0022-0302(01)70158-0
Abstract
The dairy industry in the United States has changed dramatically in the last decade. Milk production per cow has increased steadily because of a combination of improved management, better nutrition, and intense genetic selection. Dairy farms are larger, and nearly 30% of the dairy cows in the United States are on farms with 500 or more cows. The shift toward more productive cows and larger herds is associated with a decrease in reproductive efficiency. Cows with the greatest milk production have the highest incidence of infertility, but epidemiological studies suggest that, in addition to milk production, other factors are probably decreasing reproductive efficiency in our dairy herds. The reproductive physiology of dairy cows has changed over the past 50 yr, and physiological adaptations to high milk production may explain part of the reproductive decline. Critical areas for new research include control of the estrous cycle, metabolic effects of lactation on reproduction, mechanisms linking disease to reproduction, and early embryonic mortality. Solving reproductive loss in dairy cows will not be easy because only a small number of research groups study reproduction in postpartum dairy cows. Therefore, the present research base will need to be expanded. For this to occur, research funding must be increased above its current level and a renewed emphasis must be placed on solving the emerging crisis of infertility in dairy cows.]