GMOs Part 7: An unhelpful dichotomy and double standard

In my last post, we finally got to the actual definition of a GMO: a food genetically modified by genetic engineering; a very targeted technique. A NON-GMO is everything else, most of which have been also genetically modified but with less targeted techniques. This definition, instead of addressing how much a food is modified or which genes are modified, is more concerned with singling out a specific technique. It prioritizes process over product.

In this post, I will discuss this “GMO / NON-GMO” dichotomy, whether it’s helpful, and what it means to you, the consumer.

Q: Is there something about the technique of genetic engineering that justifies being singled out and having its own labelling? Is there something inherently more dangerous about it?

A: NO. On the contrary, because genetic engineering is so targeted it results in not only far fewer changes, but changes that can be identified. We choose the gene and we know its product.

For example, which food has more genetic modifications, and more unknown genetic modifications, Food 1 or Food 2?

FOOD 1 - Golden Rice - the GMO from genetic engineering. A rice with the vitamin A gene spliced into it to produce more vitamin A.

FOOD 2 - Ruby Red Grapefruit - the NON-GMO from mutation breeding. A redder and sweater grapefruit from exposing seeds to gamma radiation to accelerate mutations.

Answer: Food 2 (the Rudy Red Grapefruit) has far more genetic modifications and far more unknown genetic modifications. During mutation breeding thousands of its genes were changed, creating thousands of unknown products. The GMO Golden Rice, on the other hand, has one genetic change, with one product, vitamin A.

The double standard

Here’s the interesting part… Despite the obvious safety advantages of GMOs, the current FDA and USDA regulations require GMOs to be tested for safety. They do not require NON-GMOs to be tested for safety. Consequently, Golden Rice, with its single genetic change has been extensively tested, whereas Ruby Red Grapefruit, with its thousands of unknown changes, has not.

Are you starting to see that the “GMO vs NON-GMO” dichotomy imposes a non-sensical double standard on foods, and is unhelpful for you as a consumer.

How GMOs are tested

As I explained in prior posts, it’s very difficult to determine the long-term health effects of any food. Nutrition is a field fraught with strong opinion and weak evidence. We can’t agree on the long-term health effects of even the most basic foods.

However, there are three ways to test some components of GMO safety:

1. Nutritional content - Nutritional content is easy to measure. GMOs have the identical nutritional content of their NON-GMO counterpart, and in some cases, like golden rice, and high oleic acid soy, nutritional content is improved.

2. Allergenicity - GMO foods are tested on humans to see if they induce more food allergy. If they induce more allergy than their NON-GMO counterpart they are not approved.

3. Animal toxicology - Many GMOs are used as animal feed. This means they are tested on millions of animals. (Not just ten rats in a single experiment).

Every GMO in use, has been tested and found to be safe using the above standards. This includes industry funded and non-industry funded studies, and studies in multiple countries. Consequently, 280 different scientific agencies across the world have all provided statements declaring the safety of the GMOs on the market.

Ironically, because of this mandatory testing and double standard, GMOs can rightfully claim to be SAFER than foods recently modified with other breeding techniques which are classified as NON-GMOs.

So ask yourself this question… what does this sticker mean other than to justify a higher price on your food?

Despite all of this. Despite the unhelpful dichotomy, despite all the testing on GMOs, the anti-GMO lobby is not only is suggesting we ban GMOs, but they are suggesting that GMOs have already caused harm and responsible for many disease of the first world.

In the next post, I’m going to explain why this isn’t possible because currently we barely consume GMOs. Stay tuned…