London (31.10.2005)
– Last week saw a very dubious report from Russia claiming that people
eating GM food would die early (1). As so often with these stories, instead
of verifiable evidence there was support from well-known anti-GM pressure
groups but no actual data.
Unfortunately, people who are not adequately informed about this and similar
controversial matters get taken in, believing there can be no smoke without
fire. But they are wrong: there is no fire and the smoke is deliberately generated
to fog the issue.
Dr. Christopher Preston, Senior Lecturer in Weed Management at the University
of Adelaide in South Australia, has reviewed the matter in detail (2). With
his permission, the review is presented here in full:
Earlier this week, a Russian scientist disclosed non-peer-reviewed claims
about feeding studies with genetically modified soybeans. Dr. Christopher
Preston, from the University of Adelaide, Australia, exams the claims and
compares them with past peer-reviewed scientific publications.
The following story is starting to do the rounds of the anti-GM websites.
The original report was published in a Russian online newspaper in mid-October,
but is only now starting to do the rounds.
On the surface, this study appears to indicate a major danger with GM soy
fed to rats. There was 6-fold increase in the number of deaths and the surviving
progeny were significantly smaller. The study in question was conducted by
Dr. Irina Ermakova of the Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology
of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the results released at a conference
organised by National Association for Genetic Security.
Dr. Ermakova is a researcher on brain function whose speciality is in the
function neurotransplants into the brain, and who has published in both Russian
and English journals.
From the report, it is hard to get a good sense of how the experiments were
done. There is simply not enough information given in the report. The report
states that the experiment consisted of 3 groups of 3 rats, but results are
reported for 15 rats.
The report also indicates that the three groups of rats were condensed to
2 groups after birth. It is not clear from the report why or how this was
done. We are not told crucial points such as were there true replicates or
only pseudo-replication? Why did a third of the rats in each of the control
and GM soy groups not give birth? What was the source of GM and non-GM soy
and how much was included in the diet?
In the absence of answers to these questions, it is difficult to analyse the
data further. One question that does come to mind is why the deaths are reported
as total numbers instead of as means with an idea of the variance.
This report is a stark contrast with a previously published study by Brake
and Evenson (3) on mice. This study looked at a generational study of mice
fed a diet containing GM soy or non-GM soy. They reported identical litter
sizes for the two groups (7.3 per female in nine replicates for both groups)
and nearly identical growth rates for the mice fed transgenic feed and for
their progeny, compared to mice fed non-transgenic feed. The differences,
where they occurred, favoured the mice fed transgenic feed.
There are a number of other questions about the Russian research that come
to mind. Firstly, what is a neurological scientist doing conducting feeding
studies on GM food? This is always a question that arises when someone conducts
research outside his or her speciality.
In this case, it is quite easy to determine the motivation. A visit to Dr.
Ermakova's website (http://irina-ermakova.by.ru/eng), provides the clues.
Under the section "Publications" is a list of popular articles by
Dr. Ermakova. They include an open letter to the Russian President called
"Stop transgenization of the country", and "Russian roulette.
Delayed-action mine, or why generically modified organisms are so dangerous".
Under the section "Ecology and Life" is a list of "new articles"
described as "Important information". These include links to anti-GM
articles by Mae-Wan Ho and Beatrix Tappeser from 1997, Arpad Pusztai from
2001, the "World Scientist's Statement" from ISIS, and from bio-integrity.
Clearly Dr. Ermakova has concerns about the use of GMOs, but I suggest is
quite selective in the views she promulgates.
Secondly, why report the results at a conference organised by an anti-GM NGO?
This is an important question as it is a good way of ensuring that mainstream
scientists will take the research less seriously.
The NGO involved is called The National Association of Genetic Safety (NAGS).
According to their website (http://www.geneticsafety.org ), their mission
is described as "NAGS considers its top priority to protect the interests
of citizens of the Russian Federation as an integral part of the international
community and to facilitate the creation of a system of biological safety
of humankind and the surrounding environment."
Their goals are described as "participating in the development of legislation
that would cover the entire complex of biological safety issues, facilitating
the development of the National Genetic Safety Concept, taking part in international
projects on the issues of biological and genetic safety, spreading the ideas
of protection of genetic resources of the Earth, promoting educational initiatives
in the sphere of biological safety, creating the system of public control
over the market of food and food industry raw materials, and cooperating with
the media, government bodies, political parties and public organizations in
Russia and worldwide."
However, all of their public statements that have turned up in the Western
media (and internet) are on GM foods. For example, NAGS organised a letter
to the Russian President in October 2004 warning of the dangers of GM foods.
In the press material, GM foods were described as "dangerous in their
unpredictability" and as "biogenic terrorism".
In March 2005, NAGS released the findings of a study of a Moscow meat market,
claiming that 50% of vendors used GM feed. While this might be true, there
is significant scientific evidence that GM feedstuffs are not dangerous (see
the list of 42 peer reviewed studies I collated last year at http://www.agbioworld.org/biotech-info/articles/biotech-art/peer-reviewed-pubs.html).
The claim is disingenuous and made simply to frighten people about their food.
In June 2004, NAGS released claims about the use of GM products in baby food.
Their claims as reported in the Western Press where that 70% of samples contained
GM materials and some mixes were 100% genetically modified. Even allowing
for the problems of translation from Russian to English, this is an unequivocal
statement and certainly not true. This would leave no room for any other ingredients
including water.
Even worse, NAGS claimed that some of the dairy and vegetable mixes were entirely
made of GMO. This claim made when no GM vegetables were commercially available,
unless one counts soybeans as a vegetable. The President of NAGS, Alexander
Baranov, had claimed in 2003 that 70% of people in the US were allergic to
GMOs, a claim that hardly stands any scrutiny. With this record behind them,
it is difficult to give NAGS much credibility.
This brings me back to the question I asked: Why would you report results
of feeding studies at a conference organised by an anti-GM NGO? Surely, if
the results were that striking they would be presented to health authorities
rather than to a group of anti-GM activists? These were similar questions
to those I, and others, asked when Terje Traavik reported his results on Bt
corn at a Third World Network sponsored conference. Indeed, this whole exercise
reminds me a lot of that episode. Now 18 months down the track from Traavik's
preliminary announcement in Kuala Lumpur, we have seen no more on the issue.
The answer to my question lies in how science is being used in these episodes.
It is clear in both cases that the data available would not stand regulatory
scrutiny. This is why it has not been delivered through normal channels.
Presenting results such as these at an anti-GM conference containing true
believers is a good way of ensuring affirmation of the research. The audience
will believe it because they want to believe it, whereas a more sceptical
audience might ask some difficult questions about the research. Even more
importantly, it ensures the ability to apply political pressure with scientific
research that would not stand the rigors of normal peer review.
Sources:
1. People eating genetically modified food may have rat-short lifespan.
Pravda (27 October, 2005) (http://english.pravda.ru/science/19/94/377/16372_GMF.html)
2. Christopher Preston. Genetically-modified Soy Affects Posterity?
AgBioWorld (27.10.05) (http://www.agbioworld.org/newsletter_wm/index.php?caseid=archive&newsid=2434).
3. D.G. Brake and D.P. Evenson (2004). A generational study of glyphosate-tolerant
soybeans on mouse fetal, postnatal, pubertal and adult testicular development.
Food Chemistry and Toxicology 42:29-36
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