Old Spice GM

http://snardfarker.ning.com/profiles/blogs/monsanto-plans-to-unleash-its


Hello parents.
Look at your child.
Now look at this child.
Now look at your child.
Now back to this child.
Sadly your child is not a mutant like this child--but they could be if they starting eating genetically modified corn!


At least, that's what the anti-GM advocacy groups would like you to think. Unfortunately for them, eating GM corn is effectively no different to eating non-GM corn... If this needs any more explaining, read through some of my previous posts ;)

Labelling

This will be my last post on this blog for a while. I have a lot of other things happening in my life at the moment that need my full attention, but I may come back to this some time in the near future.

To finish everything off, I thought I would look at the controversy surrounding the labelling of GM food and food products.

I can completely understand why people would want food that is or contains genetically modified components to be labelled. It allows for everyone to make their own choice as to whether or not they will eat GM food and food products (here again I would like to stress that GM foods are safe for human consumption, assuming that they have undergone the testing required by their governments).

So below are the current labelling rules in place for Australia/New Zealand, US, Canada, and Europe

Australia/New Zealand - in 2001 it was ruled that "any food, food ingredient, or processing aid produced using gene technology and containing novel DNA and/or novel protein or having altered characteristics to be labelled as 'genetically modified'."

http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/scienceandeducation/scienceinfsanz/updates/updates2004/anzgmfoodlabellingst2461.cfm

US - From what I can find, the US position on GM food is that mandatory labelling is not necessary because food produced in GM ways is no different to food produced in 'traditional' ways (this is potentially one of the smartest things to ever come out of the US, and I mean that with absolutely no offence intended to anyone from the US - this statement is just so fantastically correct)

http://gefreebc.wordpress.com/2010/05/12/canada-codex-gm-labeling/

Canada - From what I can tell from the above article, the Canadian government aren't quite sure yet which way they want to go - seems like they see the sense in labelling, but also understand why people might not want to enforce labelling

Europe - Similar rules to Australia/New Zealand

Statistics

In many science articles, indeed in most of them, you will come across some form of statistical data. This can be in terms of numbers of things affected by something, expected outcomes, or percentages, for example.

More often than not, these statistics have been drawn from some scientific source, and along the path from source to published news article, they will get warped, misinterpreted, and even taken completely out of context.

Oftentimes, the reporter will emphasise something that, scientifically, has little meaning. An example of this I mentioned in a previous post—just because a certain number of test mice died when eating food from a GM crop, for example, does not mean that the crop is unsafe.

A lot of the time, the reporter will see this one piece of information, and miss or ignore everything else around it. Sure, a couple of mice died, but the sample size (the amount of mice tested) might be in the tens, or hundreds, or even thousands. Just because some of the mice died, doesn’t mean that it will be statistically relevant to anything.

Any number of factors could have influenced this outcome, from environmental conditions, to the genetic makeup of the individual mouse. Again, these are things that reporters will often miss or ignore.

The way statistics are presented can have a large impact on the way they are received. For example, it is much more impressive to say that some new drug has caused 100 deaths, than to say it has cured 200 people.

When talking about statistics, particularly percentages, a frame of reference is important. Say for example, you come across this sentence: 10% of patients in a study were adversely affected by a test drug. 

We have no way of knowing from that sentence how important this really is. Does it mean that 10 out of every 100 people will be adversely affected? Or that 10 out of every 100 people might be adversely affected?  And how many people were there in the study anyway? If there were only 10 people, and one of them was adversely affected, technically this is still 10% of the population size, but could something else be the issue? Just because 1 person was affected, can we really say that 1 out of every 10 people in the world will be affected?

Usually scientists will cover all of these bases within their reports, and of course to them it all makes perfect sense. But it is easy to see how when such statistics are taken out of context by the reporter, they can be blown out of proportion, or presented in such a way that is just plain confusing, and doesn’t represent what the scientist was trying to say at all.

Now of course this isn’t just the fault of the reporter, perhaps scientists need to be more careful when explaining their statistics?

Regulation

Much of this controversy has to do with a public perception of little or low regulation of the science when creating/testing/producing GM food crops and products. I think it’s about time I dedicate a post to what really happens.

All of the following information I gained from http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/consumerinformation/gmfoods/chiefscientistrespon3993.cfm, where Dr Brent, the Chief Scientist for Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ), is responding to an article that discussed this apparent lack of regulation. I find the response very open, informative, and easy to read.

In the response, Dr Brent states how the approval of all GM food depends on the outcome of an independent pre-market safety assessment, which is performed by the scientists at FSANZ. The assessments are published on FSANZ website, in their entirety, and are open for comment by the public before anything is approved. The evaluation process used is based on principles developed internationally, which is followed by Canada, Europe, Japan, and the US.

It is important to note here that FSANZ is an independent organisation, not run by any agricultural company or anything like that (more about that can be found here: http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/consumerinformation/gmfoods/fsanzlettertotheedit3509.cfm)

The companies themselves must also adhere to strict data requirements for the entirety of the project (from the initial lab stuff, all the way to extensive field trials under commercial agriculture conditions). 

“These data must be further supported by biochemical and animal toxicity studies, generated in independently certified laboratories, on any new protein arising as a result of the introduced genetic change. To complete all of the studies necessary for the regulatory assessment generally takes between five and ten years and costs many millions of dollars. All data from these studies must be provided in extensive detail such that every individual measurement and reading is provided, not just summaries or averages as is the case for published material.   The strength of this system is that regulatory scientists around the world can independently assess the information and critically evaluate the results. Like other regulators, FSANZ does not hesitate to demand more safety studies where necessary.”

Here is another interesting point:

“The small group of studies often cited as showing harmful effects due to GM foods have, without exception, been discredited by the weight of mainstream scientific evidence and opinion, including that of the UK Royal Society, and by regulatory agencies around the world. Comprehensive assessment of the studies shows that they failed to conform to accepted methods and protocols, failed to properly identify the material being tested, or failed to reach conclusions based on rigorous and logically consistent interpretation of the results. Those who criticise the internationally agreed testing regimes for GM foods are conspicuously quiet when asked to elaborate in open forum on their proposed alternative methods for testing GM foods, and to submit their proposals to scrutiny by the broader scientific community.”

As far as environmental risks go, that’s for the Gene Technology Regulator to take care of. Again, the testing performed is rigorous and transparent, and no GM product will be approved unless it is proven unconditionally to be safe for human consumption as well as for the environment.

“Together, FSANZ and the Gene Technology Regulator represent a combined system of regulation that is serving Australians well. To imply a connection between the consumption of GM foods and ill-health in people is both misleading and unsupported by any credible evidence.”

What experts?

I’d like to take a look at what experts are being called upon by each side of this controversy.

Obviously on the pro-GM side we have the scientists, who conduct the research and testing of the GM crops. It can hardly be argued that these scientists are the experts on the science of GM.

But what about all the other factors?

Being an expert on the scientific intricacies of GM does not make you an expert on the political implications of allowing/disallowing it, or an expert on the policy needed, or an expert on farming practices, for example.

On the flip side, just because you are an expert in policy, politics, or farming, that does not mean you are an expert of the science.

All of these disciplines play a big role in the controversy, putting forth their ‘professional opinion’ on matters raised (and sometimes their personal opinion too).

Yet, on the anti-GM side, I find it hard to identify any actual experts (but here we run into the issue of what is an expert?).

There are many activist groups and political parties that present data and ‘facts’ as though they are experts on the matter, but can they really be classed as experts when they are not directly involved in the science, farming, policy, political side of it all?

Few scientists seem to be actively aligned with anti-GM groups; however, many politicians and policy makers are. But as I just mentioned, how can these people be expected to present professional opinions on the science involved when they are not scientists themselves?

So why do so many people trust these activist groups more than the scientists? It could be something to do with the scare tactics mentioned in the previous post, or it could involve an ingrained distrust of science (for whatever reason). It could also be due to the active presence that anti-GM groups maintain in the public and media, while the scientists seem to sit back a little, dealing with government and non-government organisations more so than the public or the media.

Scare tactics

One thing I’ve noticed when looking at how both sides of this controversy communicate their beliefs is that they both use scare tactics.

On the anti-GM side, graphic pictures are commonly used to show how eating GM food will mutate, maim, or even kill (including children in these pictures seems to make the message more impressive). A search for ‘genetically engineered food’ in Google images will show you a vast range of such images.

They are also quite fond of using a semi-standard picture of a piece of fruit or vegetable with a syringe sticking into it, sometimes with a ‘scientist’ or ‘doctor/nurse’ holding the syringe. I think this is to emphasise the fact that the fruit/vegetable has been ‘messed with by science’. Many people have a phobia of needles, so using images such as this would add the fear factor for people who suffer from such phobias.

On the pro-GM side, images are not used so much to get the message across. Rather, they tend to emphasise the need for new technologies in food production, stating facts and statistics of how current food production techniques will not be able to keep up with future demand.

Both sides are guilty of using scare tactics to try to get their point of view across. How do these tactics affect your view of the controversy?

Frameworks (part 4 - Paradigm Shift)

Another framework that can be applied to scientific controversies is that by Thomas Kuhn – a ‘paradigm shift’.

Kuhn describes this in his book ‘The Structure of Scientific Revolutions’ (1962).

According to Kuhn, a paradigm is basically the basic, accepted theories and practices of science at a particular point in time. This science is known as ‘normal science’ – it operates within its paradigm, and allows research to move ahead rapidly.

The paradigm is supposed to be rich enough to cover everything that comes up – it helps to define what is appropriate scientific research/work, and gives theoretical foundations to work from. If a new problem arises, the science within the paradigm should be able to come up with a solution to it.

However, occasionally a problem arises that the ‘normal science’ of the paradigm can’t solve – this is known as an anomaly.

According to Kuhn, when there are too many anomalies for the paradigm to cope with, a crisis occurs. During a crisis, science is more open to new theories that can deal with the anomalies. Eventually, one theory, or set of theories, wins out and becomes the new paradigm.

So, how does GM fit into this?

The previous paradigm could be the ‘normal science’ of creating new plant varieties or improving current plants by traditional breeding methods. Now, though, we are seeing a different way of doing this – genetic engineering. I believe we are seeing a paradigm shift; the shift from traditional breeding to genetic engineering.

But...

I don’t think that genetic engineering came about from a crisis, at least not in the way Kuhn is talking about. There may have been small crises in the sense that old techniques were inefficient, or pests were becoming immune to pesticides etc, but there wasn’t a crisis in terms of rising anomalies.

I argue that paradigm shifts can occur without a crisis happening. New paradigms are borne out of new theories and techniques, but these new theories and techniques are not always borne out of problems or anomalies. Sometimes someone comes up with a new/better theory or technique by accident, or even if there was no real problem with the old one.  I think this could be the case with GM – the technique of genetic engineering was discovered, and then it was discovered that this technique could be applied in such a way as to enhance crops.

Of course I could be wrong – I don’t know why genetic engineering was first applied to crop plants, or whether genetic engineering was created for this purpose in the first place.

Frameworks (part 3 - Social Drama)

The next framework we’ll look at is the ‘Social Drama’ framework by Victor Turner.

I came across this framework in the same Gross paper as the framework discussed in the last post:

Alan G. Gross. Scientific and technical controversy: three frameworks for analysis.  Argumentation and Advocacy 42.1 (Summer 2005): p43(5).

                                                                                        

In short, Turner states that a social drama occurs when something happens to upset normal social routines. A very simple example of this would be if every single Friday you go to a certain pizza shop for dinner, but this Friday you go and the shop is closed. Another example could be that instead of the paper boy delivering the paper to your letterbox everyday on his bicycle, he is riding a hovercraft.

If we translate this into the GM controversy, the normal social routine is for new plant varieties to be made by traditional breeding methods. But now we are upsetting the normal social routine by making new plant varieties by genetic engineering.

Turner goes as far as to providing steps which social dramas follow. There are four steps – breach, crisis, redress action, and reintegration.

Step 1 – Breach - a gesture deliberately defiant of social routines.

In the case of GM, I think there were a couple of breaches. One would definitely be the introduction and application of the technology. Another could be the introduction of GM food into the marketplace.

Step 2 - Crisis – the cleavage of relevant social relations to which opposing parties belong.

Here, it is quite easy to see what sits either side of this cleavage – those for GM, and those against GM. They each have their reasons for belonging to their side, and believe their side to be ‘right’ and the other side to be ‘wrong’.

Step 3 – Redressive action – society adjudicates rival claims in arenas such as legislatures, regulative bodies, and judiciaries. (Adjudicate = to put on trial/hear case).

One could argue that we are at this stage now. Both opposing parties are fighting to get their side heard by government and other bodies of power. Both sides are pushing for legislation, regulation etc to suit their desires.

Step 4 - Reintegrate – attempt to reintegrate opposing forces into new status quo.

One could also argue that we are at this stage; scientists are trying to reintegrate everyone into the new status quo of accepting GM as a necessary new way of life, but some of the wider public are resistant of this, hence the controversy.

As we can see, the GM controversy fits quite well into this framework. Once step four has been fully implemented and accepted, I believe the controversy will be pretty much finished. Of course there will still be advocacy groups against it, and things will come up every now and then that will cause minor controversies, but I think the big controversy of GM overall will end. When this happens, we will witness a bit of a paradigm shift, which I will discuss in the next post.

Frameworks (part 2 - Moral Orders)

The first framework we’ll look at is the ‘Moral Order’ framework by Joseph Gusfield.

I came across this framework in a paper by Alan Gross (he discusses this framework along with a couple of others): Alan G. Gross. Scientific and technical controversy: three frameworks for analysis.  Argumentation and Advocacy 42.1 (Summer 2005): p43(5).

I would like to start off by saying I don’t think this is really a framework, as it does not offer any insight into how progress could be made, or how/why things should happen. Nevertheless, let’s look at how GM fits into the concept of moral orders.

According to Gusfield, society is structured according to moral orders. These moral orders influence our judgement.

Gusfield also says that moral orders ‘distort and suppress public debate over the issues that are their concern’.

There are a few moral orders that could be associated with the GM controversy, but for the sake of keeping this post reasonably short I’ll only discuss three: religion, advocacy groups, and the right to choose.

The first moral order, religion, has played a big part in this controversy. The claim that performing genetic engineering is playing God is a well known argument against GM  – for those who believe in a God, changing the genetic code of organisms is changing the way God intended them to be, and doing so is highly disrespectful, sometimes to the extent of being considered blasphemy.

Another moral order is that of advocacy groups. Groups such as Green Peace are committed to saving the environment, and as such their moral order is to be against anything that could potentially harm the environment (such as GM). On the other side, we have the moral order that suggests that since genetic engineering is a scientific endeavour, most scientists must be pro-GM – and if they are pro-GM, they are likely to cover up scientific evidence that puts a negative slant on it.

One moral code of society is that if there is a pro-group, there must be an anti-group, and in a debate situation, the moral order is for these two parties to be completely in disagreement with each other.

Then we have the moral order of being able to decide for ourselves what we eat. A big problem people have with GM is the potential for them to be eating GM products without realising it – people want to be able to decide for themselves whether to eat it or not. They see GM as a threat to this moral order, and are demanding the labelling of anything that could potentially contain GM products.

If we are to bring this controversy to a close, perhaps we need to re-think some of these moral orders and allow for undistorted public debate.

Frameworks (part 1)

Over the next few posts, I will attempt to discover which scientific controversy framework this controversy fits in to.

But to start with – what on earth is a ‘scientific controversy framework’?

Short answer – a model, or ‘framework’, into which all scientific controversies can fit, that can explain the progress of the controversy. These are very generalised, and often describe science in general (as the author sees it), but for the sake of this blog I am applying them to the GM controversy to see which fits best.

As each framework is discussed, I’d like to see if you agree with how I fit the GM controversy into it.

The first framework I will discuss in the next post tomorrow, as talking about it here will make this post far too long.

Controversy progress

This post will briefly discuss how the controversy started, what is keeping it going, and how it could potentially be closed.

As mentioned before, this is an external controversy, meaning that the controversy is between scientists and the wider public, rather than within the scientific community.

I believe it started because the wider public did not understand the science behind the concept and how it all works. This has lead to misinterpretation of scientific results, and general confusion.

So what’s kept it going? Primarily, the media and advocacy groups that are against it. We all know that the media will choose the most shocking angle of a story in order to make greater sales, and we all know that to do this often involves stretching the truth a little, or taking things slightly out of context.

When the wider public reads such stories, because they have no or little knowledge of the science itself, they don’t find it hard to believe that what the story is telling them is the complete truth, the whole story.

This sort of thing provides fuel for the advocacy groups, and there is nothing to stop such groups doing the same sort of thing themselves.

I believe we could call this a form of selective education – they will choose certain points to tell people, and not even mention the fact that other (sometimes contradictory) points exist as well.

But the media and these advocacy groups are not alone in this behaviour – science does it too. As seen in a previous post, sometimes scientists will interpret their results in certain ways, or only present certain data, in order to reach a particular goal. I believe this causes far more problems than it could possibly solve – particularly to do with trust (again, see previous post).

I also believe that scientists are not doing enough to make sure the wider public is being well informed about GM.

One way this controversy could be solved would be for scientists to communicate their research to the public in such a way that they are able to understand it.

This way, the wider public would be better able to understand what they are reading in the media, and it could help them to pick the truth from the hype.

I guess this is a job for us science communicators!

New posts tomorrow

Sorry for not posting new material over the past week or so, I've been away on holiday.

I'll get on top of things today and should have new posts up from tomorrow morning.

This is why we need better communication

http://www.collegiatetimes.com/stories/15803/genetically-modified-foods-need-government-regulation

The above article is chock full of ridiculous statements that have absolutely no basis in science, or are just plain wrong.

Yet I have no doubt that the average non-scientists would find it very hard to pick out the truth from the non-truths in articles such as this.


This is why we need to push for better communication of the science of GM...


The sentence that really caught my eye was this one: 'Another risk with GM foods involves ingesting antibiotics to the point that humans and animals could become immune to antibiotics.'


Plants don't get given antibiotics. 


People get given antibiotics. 


Antibiotics are designed to kill off disease-causing bacteria in people and animals. 


It is physically impossible for a human to become immune to antibiotics - the bacteria within you potentially could with prolonged use, but the only thing the human body would become immune to would be any side effects from taking the drugs in the first place.


Now here's a task for you at home - read the article in question and see how many other wrong things you can find, simply from what you have learnt from my blog.

Is it worth teaching the science of controversies?

Reading through a paper for an education subject, I came across this very interesting paragraph:

"In addition, the science needed for an understanding may be so recent as to post-date the school years of most adults: for example, this was the case with the recent SSE (mad cow disease) controversy. If we teach young people the science they need to understand a current-day issue, it is very likely that the scientific knowledge involved will last them for a very few years after leaving school: either the science will be dated or the controversy will be overtaken."

So in other words they are saying that there is no point teaching the science of current controversies (such as Mad Cow, or Swine Flu, GM, climate change etc) because in a few years the science will be outdated, or it won’t be a controversy any more.

Let’s look at the Mad Cow controversy – people were getting sick and even dying from eating beef. The science told us that bacteria cause Mad Cow disease, and that you should cook beef at around 70 degrees Celsius, because at that temperature the bacteria that causes the disease would die. Even though the controversy came to an end, anyone who learned that little bit of science could continue to use that scientific knowledge throughout the rest of their lives, and pass it on to others.

So I wonder how true that paragraph is? Surely big, long standing controversies such as climate change and GM won’t be solved quickly or neatly. I think they will be around for a long time, purely due to their nature.

No matter if they linger or come to a quick close, I think teaching people some of the science of these controversies would be beneficial, and last them for a long time. Even if the scientific knowledge becomes outdated, if a person understood that outdated knowledge, they should be better able to understand the newer knowledge.

But then we circle back to my last post – how much of what should we teach people?

The paper that the quote came from was:

Smith DV, Gunstone RF. Science curriculum in the market liberal society of the twenty-first century: ‘Re-visioning’ the idea of science for all. Research in Science Education. 2009;39:1.   Link

How much of what type of information?

In the previous post I asked these questions:

What type of information should non-scientists know?

How much do they need to know?

Why should they need to know it in the first place?

I believe the public should know enough about the actual science of GM in order to make reasonable, well informed decisions. To do this, they should understand what GM is, how it works, and how it may affect them going about their daily lives.

In class we discussed how there are three types of information when it comes to science: the raw data, the information that comes from interpreting that data (This one is a bit tricky, because different people, even different scientists, may interpret data in different ways. For the sake of this post, let’s assume that all information is interpreted correctly by everyone.), and then there is the knowledge that comes from combining various sets of information.

With GM, I think the public has no need to know of the raw data, as they most likely wouldn’t know what to do with it. 

When raw data is presented, it will be interpreted by the person reading it from their past experiences – if they know nothing of the science, how can they interpret the data? This can lead to misunderstanding, which in turn can sometimes lead to hysteria. 

For example, pretend a test showed that 1 out of 1000 mice died during an experiment where the mice were fed GM food. To the scientists, this may be completely insignificant, but a person who doesn’t understand the science or the test may interpret that as ‘1 in 1000 people will die from eating GM food’. This could then be expanded to say that, ‘if 1 in 1000 people died, and every person ate GM food, then because there are 6,868,900,000 people in the world, 6,868,900 people will die.’ As you can see, things can easily get out of hand.

The next level is the information that comes from interpreting the data. A lot of what you see in the media is this sort of information. A journalist has seen a scientific paper, or media release, that mentions some piece of information, so the journalist writes an article based on this. Again, this can be misinterpreted if the person doesn’t understand the science.

The final level is the knowledge that comes from combining sets of information. I believe this is the best place to start when trying to educate the public. For example, when trying to teach someone about DNA, you wouldn’t start by giving them raw data, or the interpretation of that raw data, you would give them the knowledge that has come from all of that. Once they understand that knowledge well enough, they may be able to understand the information; and once they can comfortably understand that information, they may be able to look at the raw data and make some sense of it.

So in answer to the questions at the start of the post, I believe the public needs to understand DNA and the basic process of genetic engineering. From there, they can better understand the risks and benefits (when presented fairly).

What communication problems are involved?

This question has a two-pronged answer.

Firstly, the scientists are not doing much to ensure their research is presented to the public and critics in a timely manner. When the science is presented, often the critics will pick out individual word choices as evidence that the science is ‘bad’. For example, the scientists might pick up on something that is very small and of no real significance, yet the critics may take this and blow it out of proportion.

Secondly, adequate general information about GM is not being presented to the public. Much of the general public still has no idea exactly what GM is or how it works. Those that have some idea generally do not understand it in any great detail, and so misinterpret information. The media are especially prone to this type of behaviour – I wonder how many journalists who write articles about new developments in GM actually understand what it is?

But then comes the questions of how much of what type of information should non-scientists know? How much do they need to know? Why should they need to know it in the first place? These I will discuss in the next post.

What features of scientific practice contribute to the controversy?

This is an interesting question. 

You could say that the entire science of GM is contributing to the controversy surrounding it.

Critics of this technology will pick out any bit of the science behind GM and say why it’s bad/wrong.

For example; the process of inserting the gene isn’t specific enough, the process of isolating the gene isn’t specific enough, safety testing procedures aren’t good enough, etc.

These critics will pull apart anything they can (rightly or wrongly), and if scientists defend it, the critics will either push for more ‘proof’ or move on to something else. (Proof is an interesting thing, as we discussed in class. I’ll touch on it in another post.)

I think the biggest feature of scientific practice that’s contributing to the controversy is the lack of adequate communication. I’ll talk about this in the next post.

Is FSANZ failing at communicating GM to the public?

While searching through the FSANZ website, I found this booklet. It looks like it has been produced to inform the public about GM technology with regard to food.

Looking through it, it seems to explain everything pretty well, from how it all works to potential risks to what they are doing about those potential risks.

This is the first I've seen of this booklet, and I only found it by searching through their website - it is only present on one page, in a little box saying 'related links'. I wonder, if it was intended for the public, then why have I only come across it now, and why was it in such a hard place to find? (considering I've spent all semester looking up GM info) Shouldn't something like this be posted everywhere it possibly can, to ensure as much of the public sees it as possible?

I think this is a case of bad communication - the fact that such a helpful and easy to read document isn't readily available to those who might want to find it. I didn't even know FSANZ existed until I came across them by accident. I think they should be doing more to communicate GM to the public, so the the public gets scientific information about this topic directly from the people who make the decisions on it, rather than getting a watered down, altered view from the media. They are essentially the front line for GM into Australia and New Zealand markets.

Here is a link to the booklet:
http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/_srcfiles/GM%20Foods_text_pp_final.pdf

Please read it, it might explain things better for you than I have.

Trusting the 'experts'

Thinking back to the last post, I started to wonder about the 'experts' that put themselves forward in this controversy. In this post I'm looking at two expert groups - scientists, and the people at Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ).

Of course our first instinct is to trust FSANZ, as they effectively control what food stuff is allowed to be released in Australia and New Zealand (that is their purpose). If they say it's safe, then it must be, right? I mean, they have teams of scientists who conduct all sorts of tests to determine the safety of any GM food or food product. They even ask for public feedback before anything is released into the market (assuming they pass the safety assessment).

I came across this interesting bit of info when looking through their site. The link to the page is: http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/scienceandeducation/factsheets/factsheets2010/updateaustriangovern4778.cfm

Basically, FSANZ commissioned Australian scientists to study the effect of a particular GM corn on the fertility and longevity of mice. The scientists reported at the end of the experiment that there were slight differences between the fertility of GM and non-GM fed mice. In other words, they were saying that being on a diet of GM changed the mice's fertility in some way (this isn't specified on the website).

However, when FSANZ took a close look at the report, they found 'numerous deficiencies in the experimental methods used, and in the interpretation of results.' They also found that there were calculation errors. 'As well as the calculation errors, it appears that the apparent statistical difference in the third and fourth litters is based on an unusually large litter size in the control group. Furthermore, it is worth noting that pup losses in the GM group were actually lower than in the control group in the first, third and fourth litters, however this was not reported by the authors.'


All of these errors resulted in the conclusion that there was a difference in GM-fed mice. This conclusion was incorrect. There really was no statistical difference between the two mice groups. 


FSANZ has had to dismiss the findings of the paper all together, and apparently there are no plans to re-do the experiment.


The GM corn in question had previously been shown by numerous agencies around the world to pose no risk when consumed.


When you see something like this, it makes you wonder if there was some ulterior motive behind the scientists, because these are pretty big mistakes to make. Either that, or they were pretty sloppy with their work, and very selective with what results they put forward.


Seeing this also makes me happy FSANZ exists, and that the people there are smart enough to pick up on something like this. If those original results had been released into the hands of the media or advocacy groups, you can just imagine the outrage it would cause.

In this case, it is very good that there are experts to look over the other experts shoulders and make sure what they are doing is correct.

FSANZ and the safety of ingesting recombinant DNA

Many of you will have heard/read about safety concerns regarding GM food. One of the biggest controversies in this sense is whether or not the presence of recombinant DNA (the new DNA formed when foreign DNA is inserted) is harmful to humans.

Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) says that there is absolutely no reason to fear recombinant DNA within food, as it is chemically no different to non-recombinant DNA (for the record, DNA has always been present in food, no matter if it is meat or vegetables, GM or non-GM). The fact that it is recombinant DNA is essentially meaningless.

Chances are the bit of DNA which has been inserted into the organism is from another organism that we eat anyway. Even DNA from bacteria or viruses that has been inserted into an organism to make a GM food pose no real risk in this sense – these bacteria and viruses are often naturally found on or in food we eat.

FSANZ says that the risk posed by recombinant DNA is equivalent to the risk posed by non-recombinant DNA.

As part of their strict food safety assessment process, FSANZ fully characterises the DNA that is going to be inserted into the organisms, as well as the recombinant DNA it produces. They can use this process to determine if there are any potential health risks from ingesting the recombinant DNA.

This means they can put a halt to any potentially harmful GM products very early on.

I will talk more about issues around the products of recombinant DNA in another post.

Here is the FSAZN fact sheet on the safety of ingesting recombinant DNA:

http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/scienceandeducation/factsheets/factsheets2008/gmfoodssafetyofinges4072.cfm

Glut versus Gap

In class we talked about the concept of an ‘information vacuum’. An information vacuum is described in the book ‘Mad Cows and Mother’s Milk’ by Leiss and Powell (a book about science communication) as what happens when the scientists conducting research about something make no special effort to communicate their finding to the public, and what does come out is partial scientific information that is often conflicting and mixed with public fear. (All this can be found on page 31).

Two things can happen in this instance where scientists are not informing the public in a timely, accurate manner – a glut or a gap.

A glut is when there is a shared view of the risks involved, however there is no unique agreed upon fact.

A gap occurs when there is a unique agreed upon fact, but no shared view of risks between groups.

I think GM has elements of both.

Glut – both the public and scientists agree there could be risks involved, such as environmental issues like increased invasiveness (shared view of risks involved), but they cannot agree upon how great these risks are (no unique agreed upon fact). Some advocacy groups say the risk is immense, most scientists say it is not.

Gap – there is a gap in the sense that there are undeniable benefits to GMO such as increased nutrition (this is the unique agreed upon fact), however opposing advocacy groups (including scientists in some cases) do not share a view on the risks involved (see my previous post about risks for more on this).

For the ‘information vacuum’ to be solved here, I think the scientific community needs to keep the public better updated on advancements in technology and knowledge. How they can do this effectively is a topic for a future post. 

Benefits of controversy

Although you might think that controversy is a bad thing – it isn’t always.

As seen in the last post, many factors come into play with GM, and they act upon each other in a variety of ways – internal factors can cause external factors, external factors can cause internal factors, each can inflate the other, etc.

I believe in a topic such as GM, where human and environmental health is potentially at risk, controversy is actually a good thing.

The public is demanding to know that it’s safe, that it’s worth the risks. In doing so, they are forcing the scientists to look more closely at the work they are doing, and making sure governments have regulations in place for the creation, testing, and release of GMO.

One thing that confuses me, however, is that some advocacy groups are demanding more testing for crops, yet at the same time protesting when scientists do field trials (which are the only real way to test crops)...

Internal and external factors

I think most scientific controversies have both internal and external factors contributing to the disagreements. Internal factors are those which are within the scientific community itself, whereas external factors are ones outside of the scientific community – mostly public created/driven.

GM certainly has aspects of both internal and external, but I believe the major controversy is mostly external.

There is some debate within the scientific community as to things like terminology (what exactly defines a weed, etc) and probably on what the best techniques to use for various processes are.

External factors are rife, however, ranging from advocacy groups; religious groups; disagreements over risks (see previous post); public misunderstanding, not understanding, or not willing to try to understand... this list can go on for as long as you can think about such topics.

There is also the factor of lack of research into various aspects of GM; however I think this is not really an internal or external factor, as it is not a question of scientists disagreeing with each other or public view, but more a question of public demands not being met by scientists.

Understandably, much of the external factors are probably driven by the internal factors – the public want to know everything they can about this new technology, but how can the scientists explain it to them properly when there is some debate amongst themselves? If there is any disagreement within the scientific community, the public is going to become confused and eventually lose confidence in the scientific community as a whole.

Of course, some external aspects such as religion have nothing to do with any internal factors – they are protesting the entire idea, not just some small aspect of it (such as those who demand more testing or control methods).

External factors are probably driving some of the internal factors as well – the public demands to know more about things, so the scientific community is pressed to explain through experiments/observations (in other words – prove that it is or isn’t safe/good/better etc). If there are disagreements amongst the scientists, this will become public knowledge, and the public will lose confidence... the circle continues.

Danger risks versus uncertainty risks

I’m going to delay the post about the beginning of the GM controversy for a bit – I have something a bit more exciting to talk about (plus I’m finding it really hard to find out when it actually started, so I will come back to it when I find this information). Talking about the concept of ‘risk’ in class got me thinking about the risks involved with GMO.

There seems to be two classes of risks – dangerous and uncertainty. Dangerous risk is exactly as the name suggests – there is a risk of something dangerous occurring. Uncertainty risk is where we are uncertain about the exact details of something, or we are unsure of what will happen in the future.

I think GM has both types of risks.

Obviously, there is danger risk in that the food may be harmful to humans or the environment if not properly tested/controlled. There is also the danger of not letting GM food production go ahead and ending up with a food crisis somewhere along the line.

There are also uncertainty risks – there has been little or no long term effect studies conducted to determine the danger risk, there is some uncertainty as to exactly what will happen each time a new gene is inserted into a different organism.

I’m sure you can think of many other danger or uncertainty risks associated with GMO, but the main point I want to make is that this technology involved both types of risks, and for the controversy to come to a close all of these risks need to be addressed.  

What exactly is the controversy?

Now that we all know a little bit about GM (what it is, benefits and risks etc), we can move on to the controversy which surrounds it.

There seems to be two key issues people have with GM, which appear to be largely separate:

1. They don’t understand exactly what it is, what the science is, what it all means, so they become confused and/or scared of it
2. They have moral or ethical issues, which most often stem from religious beliefs, although some people who are not religious have similar issues

Most of the scientific issues seem to stem around the fact that people don’t understand the science itself; in some cases they don’t even want to understand it, and they just assume it’s bad because it’s different and new. Those who do know/understand a little bit of the science, but are still against it, believe that the scientists are not doing enough to ensure that GM products are safe for consumption as well as safe for the environment. There are fears that GM food is harmful to human health, and will cause things such as allergies and cancer. This, as seen in the last post, can cause minor hysteria, with people going so far as to believe that eating food which contains GM in some way will lead to mutation.

Much of the ethical and moral issues stem from religion – people saying that it is against God’s will to change the genetic material of organisms which He created. (I will discuss my problems with this theory in another post.) Many people think it is just downright unnatural, often believing so because it is something that’s done in a laboratory. Other ethical and moral issues include: going against nature, ignoring animal rights, fears of monopolisation by large corporations and rich countries, goes against free will (largely to do with labelling issues), environmental risks... the list goes on and on. Each time someone thinks of something else that could go wrong with GM it adds fuel to the controversy.

In the next post, I will talk about how the controversy started in the first place.  

*sigh*

On a quick side note, as I was trolling the internet for useful articles, I came across this one. Reading the list of concerns that Russian people have about GM... well, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. This is what got me into science communication in the first place - the need to help people understand science better, so they can make better informed choices about their lives.


Here is the list of concerns:

• GM food can change the genetic code of both adults and children. Children are thought to be especially vulnerable, the consumption of GM food will make monsters or retards out of children.
• GM food causes cancer, e.g. cancer of esophagus.
• GM foodstuffs are terrible allergens.
• GM foods are the source of food poisoning.
• GM foods make humans unsusceptible to treatment with antibiotics.
• And last but not least: CM foods are either awful to taste or tasteless.

Here is a link to the full article:

http://english.pravda.ru/science/health/82020-0/

Pros and Cons - Purely Science

Ok, here is the last post I will be doing which gives background on GM. After this I will be focusing on the controversy surrounding it, rather than it itself, and I hope I have given enough background to allow you to make sense of future posts.

In this post I will briefly list the pros and cons of GM from a scientific point of view. Other points of view, such as religious debate, will be covered within my discussions on the controversy.

To start off with, here are the scientific pros of GM technology (some of these will be similar to points listed in the last post):

• The most obvious pro of GM is the potential to improve an organism in some way – for example crops can gain increased pest/disease resistance (therefore requiring less chemicals in the forms f herbicides and pesticides, which in turn lessens the amount of chemicals leaked into the environment), larger fruit, better or added nutritious value, require less water, shorten time before fruit production... the list is massive, just use your imagination!
• Precise control over what, how, where and when a gene is inserted
• Control over undesirable traits – also control methods are used to prevent the movement of traits to non-target species
• Relatively quick process
• Genes can be taken from any organism and added to the organism in question (in traditional breeding, the organisms have to be very closely related)
• Crops may need less land space to produce the same amount of food, or have the ability to grow in land currently unsuitable to most crops
• No current evidence of any health issue from consuming GM food
• Rigorous testing required of all GM organisms, products and food to prove safety before release into the market

Here are some of the cons of GM. Remember, I am only listing the scientific things here, most of the objections raised by those against GM are not scientific, but more ethical/moral.

• Although there is control over the insertion, as we do not know everything there is to know about genetics there is no absolute guarantee for what will happen (hence the rigorous testing)
• Potential to create ‘super weeds’ or ‘super bugs’
• Little research (according to the anti-GM crowd) has been conducted into any area of GM, such as long term heath issues, environmental issues etc

As you can see, the issues surrounding GM from a purely scientific standpoint are few and far between. Believe it or not, but all of these scientific issues can be, and are being, resolved with further research and testing. The list of problems with GM from a non-scientific standpoint is quite impressive, and I will cover these problems when I talk about the controversy itself.

Useful Websites:

http://www.srtp.org.uk/gmfood1.htm

http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol4/iss1/art13/

http://www.rag.org.au/baa/pros+cons.htm

http://www.sciencealert.com.au/news/20082501-16821-2.html

 http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/elsi/gmfood.shtml

Differences

Here is a short list of the differences between genetically modified foods and food produced by traditional breeding.

GM:

• Insert or remove single gene
• Gene may be from any organism
• Precise control over where gene is inserted and how it is expressed – can limit expression of gene to specific parts of the plant, such as non-food parts
• Direct control over unsafe traits, as a single gene is being added or removed
• Strict regulations for production and sale
• Relatively quick, accurate process

TB:

• Many genes are changed when breeding occurs
• Genes can only be from closely related species
• Little to no control over where and how the gene is expressed
• Unsafe traits must be bred out
• Often do not require strict regulation for production and sale
• Very slow, relatively inaccurate process

Useful Websites:

http://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/bhcv2/bhcarticles.nsf/pages/Genetically_modified_foods

http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~frist/Seminars/biotech/comparison.html

http://www.who.int/foodsafety/publications/biotech/20questions/en/

http://www.beep.ac.uk/content/373.0.html

Traditional Breeding

The term ‘traditional breeding’ usually refers to the process of ‘selective breeding’, which has been used by humans for centuries. As I said in a previous post, selective breeding is basically where you breed two organisms of the same, or very similar, species together in order to create offspring which hopefully will have desirable traits. These can be anything from bigger fruit, brighter flowers, disease or pest resistance, larger leaves... the list goes on and on.

When two organisms mate and produce offspring, the offspring inherit  a random selection of genes from each parent. This means that there is absolutely no guarantee that the desired trait will appear in the offspring. When you breed two organisms together, there is no way for you to control which genes are passed on to and expressed in the offspring. This means that the gene responsible for making larger fruit might not be passed on at all.

It also means that other genes, possibly less desirable ones, can be passed on as well or instead. Even if the correct trait is passed on, there is no way to stop less desirable traits being passed on too. Sure, you could end up with bigger fruit, but they might be bitterer or have a dull colour. There is also no way to stop harmful traits from being passed on, such as high toxin levels. Once these are bred into the organism, you then have to take even more time breeding it back out while still keeping the desirable traits.

Another downfall of selective breeding is the time it takes to get it right. Due to the fact that you are breeding organisms together, you have to wait for them to be in mating season. It can also take a very long time to get the right combination of traits in the offspring – there’s no guarantee that the first generation of offspring will have the desired traits, it could take many generations to get it right.

Many of those who oppose GM question the need for such drastic measures when we already have a working technique to achieve the same end. It is a reasonable argument, however GM has many benefits over traditional breeding, which I will discuss in the next post.

Useful websites:

http://www.plantgenomesecrets.org/genome-basics/traditional-breeding-marker-assisted-breeding-transgenic-plants

http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~frist/Seminars/biotech/comparison.html

The Science Behind GM

In the last post I gave some simple descriptions of some of the terms you are likely to hear/see when learning about GM – as promised, here is a more detailed description of what exactly happens in Genetic Engineering.

Scientists have found enzymes (proteins which act as catalysts within the cell to speed up or slow down processes) which can cut DNA and paste it back together again. This has allowed scientists to cut out whole genes from one set of DNA and paste them into another set of DNA, usually within another organism.

Scientists have also discovered little things called vectors, which are strands of DNA that can insert themselves into other DNA. An example of this is a virus.

Using this knowledge, we can now customize the DNA of organisms to a degree.

Why would we want to do this?

In crops, for example, if one crop is resistant to a specific disease which another crop is highly susceptible to, we can take the individual gene from the resistant crop and insert it into the susceptible crop. All of a sudden, the susceptible crop can become resistant!

This is very handy, as it can reduce to need for insecticides, pesticides, fungicides etc. Or even make fruit ripen later after picking (extending the shelf life), make it larger or juicier, allow crops to become more resistant to things such as heat and frost... the possibilities are endless.

Many people question the need for such drastic measures. Haven’t we already been doing this sort of thing all along with traditional breeding?

Look out for my next post, which will explain in more detail exactly what traditional breeding is, and why scientists are turning from this to GE in order to improve crops.

Useful Websites:

Enzyme:

http://biotech.about.com/od/glossary/g/Enzyme.htm

GE:

http://www.safe-food.org/-issue/ge.html