GMO's & The Non-GMO Project

Hello all! I apologize from my blogging hiatus as this season of life has not allowed for myself to personally publicize the information I know you want to read and hear. My favorite parts of my profession is digging through research and attempting to find the truth in what is a confused message from healthcare professionals.

Remember, Registered Dietitians (RD) or now commonly called Registered Dietitian Nutritionists (RDN) are THE leading experts in nutrition. Also remember, anybody can call themselves a nutritionist, even the quack on the TV telling you to stop eating entire food groups. We have devoted our entire education on studying the science of nutrition. Most physicians get only 3-9 hours of any nutrition education who is taught by, wait for it, a Registered Dietitian!

Sorry for the rant but the following topic is a passion of mine. Katie Knight, if you remember, is a senior dietetics student who has written on this blog before. I know you will love her evidence-based no non-sense approach to explaining the basics of GMO's. Enjoy!

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Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are one of the most misunderstood advances in nutrition technology. The purpose of this article is to educate you, the reader, in the science behind GMOs (and the history of the Non-GMO Project) so that more people can be informed about what GMOs actually are. This article is not written in an attempt to sway your opinion; it is written to present the facts and research, so that both pros & cons will be presented.

First, what are GMOs? Genetically-modified organisms are organisms that have a few single genes artificially inserted into their genetic code. GMOs were first created by Boyer & Cohen in 1973 to make crops more resilient to pests and changing weather/temperature [1]. Selective breeding is different in that plants or animals with desirable traits are bred to continue producing the same desirable trait; they don’t have genes from other organisms inserted into their genome. Selective breeding has occurred for about 30,000 years and this is why we have modern, domesticated plants and livestock [2].

While GMOs sound frightening, many similar processes, such as random mutations, occur entirely naturally. Random mutations are slight changes in the genetic code of all organisms, including humans, that can either have positive (such as becoming more resistant to a disease) or negative (such as random mutations causing a cancerous tumor) effects [3]. Additionally, evolution requires accidental genome manipulation, in which organisms with traits that allow them to successfully adapt to their environment survive to reproduce long enough to pass these favorable qualities to their offspring. Evolution occurs when these favorable traits change enough for the subsequent generations to be considered new species. This process can take millions of years [4]. So, genetic modification constantly occurs in nature. GMOs can be thought of as an artificial and faster way to deliberately modify genes – they’re similar to natural processes.

So, are GMOs “good” or “bad”? Much of the concern surrounding GMOs is that scientists haven’t tested them thoroughly enough to know if there will be any negative health effects in the future. However, when looking at the science, current research suggests that GMOs are safe. According to a systematic review by Snell et al. published in Food and Chemical Toxicology, there is no evidence that GMOs present health hazards, including toxicity [5]. Many other credible organizations have determined that GMOs are safe as well, such as The National Academy of Science’s Genetically Engineered Crops: Experiences and Prospects report [6].

Why is there fear and misunderstanding surrounding GMOs if most scientists consider them to be safe? They’re also nearly unavoidable: more than 90% of U.S.-grown cotton, corn, and soybeans are genetically- modified crops [7]. Other mass-produced GE crops include potatoes, papayas, squash, canola, apples, and sugar beets [8]. The answer is that there are benefits and drawbacks to GMOs, and that uneducated people are more likely to worry about the “unknown.”

According to Nature, one of the possible negative consequences is that “potential health risks to humans include the possibility of exposure to new allergens in genetically modified foods, as well as the transfer of antibiotic-resistant genes to gut flora.”[9] And while GMOs were created to be resistant to pests and weeds (and therefore decrease herbicide use), they’ve actually increased the need for herbicides, since some weed species have developed herbicide resistance [10]

There are also positive benefits of GMOs. Golden rice is a GE crop that produces beta-carotene, which becomes vitamin A in the human body. Golden rice was designed to prevent vitamin A deficiencies in lower-socioeconomic children, since kids are sometimes unable or unwilling to take pills [11]. And GMOs have “generally-favorable” effects on the environment and agriculture while typically having a neutral effect on human health (except for GMOs especially designed to be healthier) [12].

The Non-GMO Project can be misleading to consumers because they label food products that don’t contain genetic material – such as salt, consisting of a sodium and chloride atom, or water, consisting of one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms – as being non-GMO. This is misleading to less educated consumers, because they may not realize that nonliving items don’t have a genome, and therefore cannot be genetically modified. While it doesn’t hurt to be informed about what is being consumed, putting a non-GMO label on a nonliving food product is promoting scientific illiteracy and fear instead of knowledge.

*I do not own any photos

References:

[1] http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2015/from-corgis-to-corn-a-brief-look-at-the-long-history-of-gmo-technology/

[2] http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2015/from-corgis-to-corn-a-brief-look-at-the-long-history-of-gmo-technology/

[3] https://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/genetic-mutation-1127

[4] https://today.oregonstate.edu/archives/2011/aug/lasting-evolutionary-change-takes-about-one-million-years

[5] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691511006399?via%3Dihub

[6] http://nas-sites.org/ge-crops/

[7] https://timedotcom.files.wordpress.com/2015/04/err162.pdf

[8] http://time.com/3840073/gmo-food-charts/

[9] https://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/genetically-modified-organisms-gmos-transgenic-crops-and-732

[10] http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2013/genetically-modified-organisms/

[11] http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2013/genetically-modified-organisms/

[12] http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=23395