What Do You Call A Sugar Beet Crossed With A Fish?

written by Marina Zacharias

In the wild and wacky world of genetic engineering you call it "new and improved!!"

As if we don't have enough trouble with our food supply from "orthodox" sources, the attempt by mankind to interfere with the fundamental blueprint designed by nature, is both dangerous and frightening. The lack of long term testing, (and in some cases short term testing) the fact that these foods do not need to be labeled, and the fact that they could be donwright dangerous, is not getting the attention it deserves.

In the case of the sugar beet, the purpose of the fish gene that they isolated was to acquire a gene for a protein. A gene, basically, is a blueprint. This fish gene was a blueprint for protein that was present in the blood of the Arctic Flounder. This particular protein functions like an antifreeze in the blood of the Arctic Flounder. In very cold temperatures the fish will not freeze. The rationale was to put a blueprint into the sugar beets so they would produce an antifreeze protein and be grown in colder climate or in a place that has a shorter growing season.

The problem is that when they put a single new gene into an organism, it isn't a perfectly controlled process. Quite often, unexpected effects occur. These effects can cause food that is produced to be allergenic or toxic or reduce it's nutritional value. It isn't like surgery, per se, it is a very sloppy, random process.

Would the FDA really allow anything dangerous to enter the market place? Let's take a look at what's already happened and you can draw your own conclusions (i.e "think for yourself").

Here are some facts about the L-Tryptophan fiasco that you may not be aware of. Tryptophan was produced by Showa Denko (a Japanese chemical company) for many years as a nutritional supplement for the health food industry. They basically used a fermentation process to produce natural bacteria for their product.

Then they decided that by genetically engineering the bacteria they could produce tryptophan more effectively. The FDA allowed them to put the genetically engineered product on the market without further testing. They argued that the tryptophan was still tryptophan, just produced by another method. They felt it was "the same thing".

They put it on the market and within a few months 1,500 people had been permanently disabled by it. Seven were killed. The genetic manipulation that caused the bacteria to produce more tryptophan also caused them to produce a powerful toxin which was present in the final tryptophan product. The toxin alters the functioning of the immune system causing a wide variety of problems.

It was the Center for Disease Control that sorted the whole thing out--not the FDA. The product L-tryptophan is perfectly safe if made in a natural way but the CDC did some very careful epidemiological studies that nailed down very clearly that it was the genetically engineered product that was causing the problem.

So here we had a product of biotechnology that was embarrassing to the FDA and potentially embarrassing to the bio-technology industry. They found the best way out of it was to make the health food industry the scapegoat for the whole thing and promptly banned all tryptophan products from the market as dangerous. Simply not true!! This wasn't a food supplement problem, but a genetic engineering problem, a bio-tech problem, and a regulatory problem.

If this were the only case of unexpected results, I would be less concerned. However more and more reports are coming out that this giant experiment with our food chain has a huge potential for harm in our future.

Take the case of the big multinational feed company, Pioneer Hybrid. They had the idea of genetically engineering soybeans to contain balanced amino acids--all the amino acids that you need for complete nutrition. What they did is take a gene from Brazil nuts and put that gene into soybeans.That did balance out the amino acid composition, which on the surface seems like a great thing. FDA ruled that it was acceptable to put these things on the market with a few little restrictions.

But unexpectedly those same genetic manipulations caused the soybeans to produce a powerful allergen that caused strong allergic reactions in many people. Fortunately, when Pioneer Hybrid discovered that these soybeans were allergenic they decided not to commercialize them. If this product had gotten to the market it likely would have killed some people from antiphalactic shock reactions to the potent allergen. They lost millions of dollars on the project.

Speaking of losing money, how many of you remember the highly touted "Flavr-Saver" tomato? This was one of the first genetically engineered vegetables that got out there. They engineered it so that it was supposed to stay looking fresh on the shelf longer. Turns out that the same genetic manipulations caused the skin to be weaker, so that when they were ready to harvest, they couldn't use the standard mechanical harvesting equipment. It made tomato puree of the tomatoes. Another financial flop! That's why you don't find it on your grocery shelves now.

Another example is genetically engineered cotton seed that was sold last summer to farmers across the South and Southwest. This cotton was engineered to be resistant to the boll-worm. They got it out in the field and the boll-worms loved it and ate it like candy. There are now class action suits against Monsanto for deceptive advertising of this product.

Certainly not the results expected by the companies involved!

Right now the big thing in the bio-tech industry is genetic engineering to produce grains and vegetables that carry their own built in insecticides.

For example potatoes have been engineered with a gene that carries a toxin in it that kills potato bugs. The plant carries the toxin pervasively throughout the whole plant. Supposedly this is a very specific toxin that doesn't hurt mammals. At least that is what the short term LD 50 studies indicate. There is however, strong data from the University of North Carolina that is showing high concentrations of the toxin produces resistant pests in a few generations. So then what? Develop another toxic gene?

No long term studies have been done on these genetically mutated plants and nothing has been done to assess possible allergy or food intolerance responses. With respect to the limited animals studies, here's a line from the July/97 issue of Acres U.S.A.--"If a rat has a splitting headache from eating something, the rat can't tell you". Maybe it doesn't kill him at 50 times concentration but does it have any other effect?

One of the greatest dangers in unleashing this giant experiment without careful consideration, is the risk of damaging the integrity of the gene pool throughout agriculture. Cross pollination makes it very difficult to keep the genetically engineered crops in their own field and not contaminate non-genetically engineered crops in adjacent fields. There can be "gene drift" that over time could effect a whole countryside.

The organic community is taking this very seriously and is working now to figure out how to handle this--at least to set up some guidelines for testing seeds to make sure that what they put in the ground is free of genetically engineered genes.

I really have difficulty in having any confidence with the "scientific" assurances that mucking around with the fundamental blueprint of nature is safe. Personally I don't want to eat foods that have been genetically altered and I sure don't want to feed them to my animals. Without any need to label this stuff, I guess the only thing I can do is to try to stay with "Certified Organic" food as much as possible.

Just as DDT was an unknown quantity 25 years ago (with "scientific" assurances of safety), genetically engineered foods are an unknown quantity today. The evidence isn't there to demonstrate long-term safety of these things. From the little I have seen with mankind's attempt to outsmart nature, I would be more inclined to think that there is more of a tendency that this will create significant health risks in the future.

I guess time will tell. In the meantime, draw your own conclusions on this latest "nutritional experiment".

If you would like to learn more about homeopathic and herbal remedies; reputable companies that supply them; recommended books; or where to find veterinarians who specialize in this field, call or write to: Marina Zacharias, P.O.Box 1436, Jacksonville, OR. 97530

Phone: (541) 899-2080 • Fax: (541) 899-3414 • Email: inquiries@naturalrearing.com