Sara2 Posted April 22, 2013 Report Share Posted April 22, 2013 Garbage In means Garbage Out... Is our biological science & experimental research results endangered by GMO feed being given to our lab rats??? This could be serious trouble, sooo what "the hell" is going on with GMO? It can be very alarming reading numerous online anti-gmo protest websites, so I'm being alarmist on behalf of our essential lab associates. I don't understand why 'some' of our GMO science seems so hell bent on ignoring or bypassing many potential health risks that could directly affect or threaten our health, longevity, and possibly all life and the environment too. That's 'awesome' potential and power! Reading "the above" you might think I'm formulating a "conspiracy theory". I don't think so... but there is plenty of gmo-conspiracy online... I found this often quoted and interviewed retired bio-scientist online: For 50 years, he's been a scientist studying plant diseases in the U.S. and around the world and spent 35 years at Purdue University as Professor Emeritus of plant pathology. He has a 41-year military career as a retired Colonel, evaluating natural and manmade biological threats, including germ warfare and disease outbreaks. He coordinates the “Emergent Diseases and Pathogens Committee” as part of the USDA National Plant Disease Recovery System under Homeland Security. =========================== Is he controversial too? Well, yeah, he is interviewed by a lot of anti-gmo organizations including one that posted those credentials for him above. His name is: Dr. Don M. Huber, Emeritus Professor of Plant Pathology, Purdue University. (I think he retired in about 2007.) I don't want "to bloat" this post with his commentary that can easily be found if you just search his name, and then you can find many anti-gmo sites quoting & offering video interviews of him too. To try to learn the pros/cons of gmo viewpoints I found a gmo-plant science website, which is made-up of both new and experienced professional and academic researchers and scientists. I found this article about Dr. Huber... it is worth reading whether you are pro/con gmo. Link: http://www.biofortified.org/2011/02/extraordinary-claims%E2%80%A6-require-extraordinary-evidence/ There were many excellent points made in the comments section too from that article linked above (except for several off-topic comments that went astray). The gmo food controversy, its global politics, and, especially, its science is a really fascinating area "to study" and learn more about it if you have the time and interest. I could do this for years, since this is "so freaky" science that has the power to do great good or incredible damage, really, unimagined and unintended consequences could be outcomes for all of life on earth within the next few decades. I have read that some (if not the majority) of USA Lab Rat/Mice chow will likely have GMO ingredients. These will likely be in the Corn, Soy, Beet, and Canola/rapeseed oil. Most European Lab Rat/Mice feeds will not have GMO if made in the EU. Despite all the "conspiracy theories" going around the net about gmo foods I found one scientist post this at the same website linked above... "One aspect of this that I have described in the past is rodents in biomedical research. I used to work at one of the premier mouse facilities on the planet. These animals since the mid-1990s were *not* getting organic mouse chow. Here is a place where you can see the ingredients in mouse chows: http://www.labdiet.com/rodent_diet.html (but this is just one supplier, of course). You can open up various recipes--such as "breeder diet" and see what's in there. They know. The one I opened had corn and soybean as the first ingredients. Now, these organisms are performance animals from this research facility. They cannot be sick. They have defined characteristics. They are monitored and evaluated constantly. You can even see what conditions are in the facility rooms. Here you can see examples of the status reports. http://jaxmice.jax.org/health/index.html They are the best studied organisms on the planet, I'd wager. Not only are they studied at the production facility--they are followed and studied at the purchaser facility as well. If they were having diet issues it would have been identified immediately. If there were multi-generational issues, this industry would be dead right now. You'd have to imagine a world-wide conspiracy to keep quiet that there was some kind of problem. (Well, of course, that's actually something opponents believe anyway...sigh...). You'd also have to discount all biomedical research since the 90s. Because if there were some kind of confounding issues, everything would be invalid, right? There was a time in the 90s when a batch of mouse chow was made with insufficient Vitamin E. Researchers around the country were noticing the problem, and reports were coming in. It was traced back to a chow provider and fixed. If there was a giant problem with mouse food, we'd know. There just isn't. I know it's not perfect. But it's about as carefully studied and multi-generational as you can get. Another thing I just thought of was pet average lifespans over the last decades. Is there any data on that? I assume most pets are fed commercial conventional foods. It might be another nice data set to examine." ============================= S2: I haven't found any studies about GMO vs non-gmo Lab Rat chows, but this would certainly be a very interesting subject to learn what may have been tested and researched to date. I think if some health issues were obvious, then there would have been some "recalls" of Lab Rat feed in the last decade or so. Many studies may be limited to 90 days, so there may not be enough time to pick-up on any long-term problems. From what I've read so far "long-term" studies need to be at least one year or more. GMO-Man is playing with God-like powers and much of it is based on a gold-rush to quick profits without direct government over-site and, instead, the acceptance of industry research with secrecy and hidden (potential negative side effect) data is already evident and cloaked as proprietary for GMO "regulation". It is definitely not "the better safe than sorry" approach. More like "damn the torpedoes and full speed ahead". Mankind faces the unleashing of all kinds of pathological and sociopathic dangers that industry self-regulation poses, when safety testing is inadequate promoting no long-term ethical constraints or serious long-term review process. At present, we're lacking independent open research combined with the strict regulations necessary to detect long-term side-effects. Without thorough safety research some GMO product will likely unleash some deadly consequence, but we may not know it till years later after the damage is done and detected in the aftermath. Unfortunately, this is radicalizing and creating hostile political movements against GMO with a large dose of "conspiracy theories" thrown-in making many paranoid about this issue. I truly believe some crop diseases will be prevented by some safe GMO innovations, even healthier foods can be created, but the companies making these products need to do long-term safety studies of 1-2 years for the rats/mice *AND* release the blood-work data too. I prefer safe-open science over radical conspiracy protests online or in the streets that will take hold if the data is kept secret and unavailable or never done. I'll be studying this issue over time and will report back any findings to this thread. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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