ISIS Press Release 25/01/05
PR Posing as Science in Crop Biotechnology
Prof. Joe Cummins and Dr.
Mae-Wan Ho expose the corruption of traditional standards in science
reporting of GM crops
The emergence of genetically modified (GM) foods and crops has
profoundly impacted scientific reporting not only in the popular media but also
in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Public relations (pr) statements, once
confined to the promotion of commercial products, now frequent the pages of
scientific journals.
Science was built on the foundations of full and truthful reporting of
observations and findings; not anymore. If anything, scientific reports that
expose the propaganda of corporations, government and academic promoters of GM
crops are either rejected for publication outright, or gratuitously attacked
when they appear in print; and the scientist(s) involved mercilessly prosecuted
and victimized, as in the case of Dr. Arpad Pusztai and his co-workers in the
UK, who lost their jobs in 1998 or soon after; and Prof. Ignacio Chapela,
researcher from the University of Berkeley, California, currently fighting to
regain his tenure (http://society.guardian.co.uk/societyguardian/story/0,7843,1392979,00.html).
In contrast, GM proponents are given free license to make pr statements
posing as science.
No Bt resistance?
In the January issue of Nature Biotechnology, Sarah Bates and
coworkers observe that transgenic plants expressing insecticidal proteins from
the bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) were first commercialized in
1996 "amid concern from some scientists, regulators and environmentalists that
the widespread use of Bt crops would inevitably lead to resistance and the loss
of a ‘public good,’ specifically, the susceptibility of insect pests
to Bt proteins." But, they continue with apparent self-satisfaction, "Eight
years later, Bt corn and cotton have been grown on a cumulative area >80
million ha worldwide. Despite dire predictions to the contrary, resistance to a
Bt crop has yet to be documented, suggesting that resistance management
strategies have been effective thus far."
The resistance management strategies include planting non-GM acreage as
refuge to slow down the evolution of resistant insect pests and the use of high
toxin dosage along with pyramiding more than one toxin genes in a crop.
In reality, however, the main reason that insect resistance has not been
detected in the United States - not mentioned in the article - is that
the US Environment Protection Agency has allowed the GM crop and refuge to be
sprayed with chemical insecticides (see "No Bt resistance?" ISIS Report,
http://www.i-sis.org.uk/nobtresistance.php).
Spraying with chemical insecticides protects the crops from pest damage in the
refuge, and also kills off any insects resistant to the GM crops.
The authors also failed to mention other factors that might affect the
evolution of resistance - the use of synthetic toxin genes that differ in amino
acid sequence from the natural toxin in commercial GM crops, and the variation
in toxin production among different GM crops - although these factors are
probably not as significant as spraying chemical insecticides in the refuge.
Nevertheless, they could lead to underestimating the evolution of resistance by
failing to detect resistant insects. Tests for insect resistance are frequently
carried out using the toxin proteins isolated from bacteria and not the actual
toxin produced in the GM crop.
In Canada, chemical insecticides have not been allowed in the refuge of
Bt crops until the upcoming growing season, but there does not appear to have
been any effort to screen for resistance in that country.
That paper is just the latest in a string of misleading reports that
have been deliberately selective and incomplete in order to serve pr purposes.
PR by misrepresentation, permissive substitution and surrogate
testing
Advocates have persistently maintained that GM crops are a simple
extension of plant breeding and selection carried on for thousands of years.
That fiction ignores the basic fact that GM crops are produced in the
laboratory by illegitimate recombination – a process whereby pieces of
foreign DNA break the host genome to insert themselves at unpredictable places
- while traditional plant breeding and selection depending largely on
homologous (legitimate) recombination during reproduction.
What is seldom stated is that GM crops are produced using synthetic
approximations of natural bacterial genes, whether it is in conferring
resistance to herbicides or to insect pests.
The synthetic approximations of natural genes are used because the
bacterial genes function poorly in plants, which use different codes for the
same amino acids. Hence, synthetic genes could be 60% homologous with the
bacterial genes in DNA sequence and yet produce proteins that have the same
amino acid sequence as the bacterial proteins. But amino acid sequences are
also frequently altered in the GM plants to increase solubility. C-terminal
amino acids (at the end of the protein chain), too, have been changed on the
assumption, without any proof, that the changes do not affect biological
activity.
Also concealed from the public is that "safety" assessment of GM crops
has been performed using protein products and genes from the bacteria rather
than the crops. The regulators have apparently agreed that the expense of
purifying the products from GM crops need not be incurred as the products can
be recovered at little expense from liquid bacterial cultures. So none of the
safety tests have been done with the proteins and genes in GM crops!
The regulators argued that so long as the crop proteins had active sites
and epitopes characteristic of the bacterial protein, they must be
"equivalent". In this way, they have allowed millions of human being to be
exposed to products that are untested and unknown with regard to safety. As the
GM foods are not labeled, there is no way that their health impacts on the
population can be identified after they are released.
The regulators seem to presume that the synthetic DNA and RNA produced
are biologically inactive except for making the protein. That is a specious
belief. It is well known, for instance, that DNA with excess of CpG activates
innate immunity and induces inflammation. Similarly, the regulatory role of
small RNA species is becoming increasingly evident (see "RNA subverting the
genetic text" SiS 24 http://www.i-sis.org.uk/isisnews.php).
There are numerous examples of DNA and RNA sequences that have major regulatory
roles apart from coding for proteins. Even freshman students would recognize
the importance of testing the actual synthetic genes and proteins present in GM
crops rather than the surrogates produced in bacteria.
Finally, the synthetic genes and gene products that have been assessed
as "safe" purely by bureaucracy are new to our food chain and the ecosystem and
to the entire evolutionary history of the earth.
The scientific journals that should have played the leading role in
safeguarding the traditional standards of good science and the public good have
been co-opted into performing the most insidious kind of pr for unscrupulous
corporations and scientists pushing the corporate agenda. They are no longer to
be trusted.
Source
Bates SL, Zhao JZ, Roush RT & Shelton AM. Insect resistance
management in GM crops: past, present and future. Nature Biotechnology
2005, 23, 57-62/
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