Several correspondents in this debate seemed to see many of the studies for more than they give us.
Many of the feeding studies at best give us a lead to the need for more evaluation.

When I look at a feeding studies results I check it on 3 areas, validity, relevance and significance.

Validity, is where much this debate has been eg. Pusztai's results and the royal society etc. However argument here and references given mix up the different studies he did, some with valid controls and no GM potatoes others with GM potatoes and no valid control. I cannot put those studies together and get valid results, attempts to do so are rarely credible.

Relevance is equally important and when toxicology is involved it is about dose rate. Can we set a MRI that makes issues with the toxin irrelevant to commercial practice, human health, environment etc. Relevance is also wider than even dosage, such an example is Pusztai's results which refer to a particular toxin in potatoes which have not been considered for entry into the food chain, even though the research is more than 10 years old.

Significance is the consequence of the negative event and the likelihood when compared to improvements the innovation can bring. The example is BT. In every cotton, maize and rice enterprise GM BT varieties have seen big measurable improvements in the health and well being of farm workers or local inhabitants or consumers which totally overshadow the negative affects of BT discussed here.

To spend large amounts of time discussing the minutia of one area when in other areas the study is not credible is a waste of time when we are considering the approved crops and those about to be approved.

To recapitulate you need no negatives for validity, relevance and significance for a study to be a large part of the crop approval decisions.

hi For Choice

1.I was reading with interest up to "In every cotton, maize and rice enterprise GM BT varieties.....overshadow the negative affects of BT discussed here" when I had to grab my computer as it tried to float to the ceiling from all the hot air that that claim is made of. I wish you no animosity but that's a totally unsupportable claim.

2. ANY people getting sick or dying from anything, is NOT something to be "overshadowed".

Agronomist

If anyone knows about "cherry picking data" it's you. I see you pick so many cherries that you should open a GM fruit & veg outlet.

For example :

(i) Re your comebacks on my B&E paper post - one small table of weights without showing any relationship to intake, is scientifically unusably sloppy. Even I can see that.

(ii) Ermakova used rats and B&E used mice - they have different feed requirements. (So "in a sense " it's not a repeat of the same, as you try to assert )

(iii) "They also measured and reported the composition of the feed" - they may as well have also listed the composition of the nearest corn flakes box - again, I re-iterate, without relationship to how much was eaten, the results are unusable.

Not to mention, and I quote the Dr Brian John comments on this referenced B&E male testicular study ( not a feeding study ) of yours -

" ...no idea what happened to their male mice once they were born; there is no feeding protocol, no data, no weights, no feed intake, and no data on growth patterns related to feed intake."

The seed sources, and verification of the NonGM / GM status of the seed samples, for the B&E study are unstated and unconfirmable, as is whether the same combine was used to harvest both types or not. This was in the days before the contamination factors of GM was well known remember.

I know you are familiar with ALL the data, but please everyone read the full comment from Dr Brian John here :

http://www.food.gov.uk/multimedia/pdfs/acnfp_75_11_gmsoya.pdf

Hi All,
GM technology is based on the concept of an “industrial gene” that is simple, stable, produces only one trait and, most importantly, is patentable.

Unfortunately recent advances in genetic science show that genes work in networks or families. One gene can affect many different characteristics and qualities in organisms. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/01/business/yourmoney/01frame.html?ei=5088&en=e8a6202e0162538f&ex=1340942400&adxnnl=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&adxnnlx=1218002448-ShpskbK1Sw8d/CzpMzhc0A

Therefore the whole substructure on which GM food, crops and technology is built is fundamentally flawed.

The science, legislation, myths and regulations that surround GM are all similarly unstable as they are based on the same error.

GM crops and food have been forced on an unwilling public in country after country. http://www.gmwatch.eu/categories/3-Monthly-Review

There is increasing unrest in the very centre of GM, the US. Farmers, co-ops and other groups are being sued over GM crop patents. There is an ever increasing seed monopoly with Monsanto being the largest seed company in the world. This has resulted in the price of a bag of corn seed increasing by 35%. The OCM group of farmers in the US show what is happening to them and how they are fighting back http://www.competitivemarkets.com/

One way or another GM will eventually collapse – loss of subsidies, increasing price of inputs, ecological damage caused by GM farming, farmer and consumer revolt etc,

We must hope that not too much damage is done before that.
Thanks for being part of the discussion and helping to hone my investigation skills.
Signing off now

hi,

Thank you everyone - I have more to offer here but must prioritise my time towards other things now.

Rob - don't worry about the details of the 25 nobel laureates as I'm, coincidentally with lillian, leaving this forum. I assume I can get them from you or elsewhere if I need them. I do suggest you look further and more deeply into all that GM entails, and its history - don't take anything at face value.

When I started looking into GM a few years ago I knew nothing and had no position either way. I still have an open mind but am yet to see sufficient argument to support any part of the GM industry, science or agendas.

Thanks Rojo for your offer to contribute to a filmed forum - it's a serious intention but just a little down my list at the moment - I will definitely contact you when it's got wheels. I have some other projects almost ready to launch that require my attention right now.

I, too, believe that "One way or another GM will eventually collapse – loss of subsidies, increasing price of inputs, ecological damage caused by GM farming, farmer and consumer revolt etc" ( see lillian above ), and that there are better alternatives out there getting ready to establish themselves.

I sincerely also put it to all the proGMers - especially the "GM-tragics" I'll call them ( Agronomist, RobfromCanada, David Tribe, Prof Rick Roush etc ) that you all have truly honest, open minded look at who and what you are defending and supporting.

Maybe you'll get an insight into what the NoGMers are on about.

I also must correct an earlier comment - my sources told me that they heard Pro Rick Roush state publicly there were no human health feeding studies done - actually it was David Tribe, microbiologist, though Rick Roush was adjacent to him at the front of the audience, and didn't contradict him. Apologies for that minor inaccuracy.

Sincerely, me

Just for completeness, the following quote comes from the ANZFA (Australias food regulatory agency) after its evaluation of herbicide tolerant Canola GT73.

"Conclusions

No potential public health or safety concerns have been identified in the safety assessment of food derived from glyphosate-tolerant canola. Based on the data submitted in the present application, food derived from glyphosate-tolerant canola, can be regarded as equivalent to food derived from conventional canola in respect of
its composition, safety and end use. ANZFA proposes that an amendment be made tothe Standard A18 - Food Produced Using Gene Technology of the Food Standards Code to include oil derived from glyphosate-tolerant canola."

This is the same conclusion every other food regulatory body in the world(that has looked at this variety of HT canola) has come to.

RoushysLoveChild, firstly what are your hypotheses? What might be changed in GM food that could result in a health concern in humans?

From there you develop the testing regime. The testing regime could (and perhaps should) be different for different products because each one poses a different set of risks. Here is quite a good discussion on the thinking you might employ http://www.jacn.org/cgi/content/full/21/suppl_3/166S More can be found here http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?isbn=0309092094

As for the Brake and Evenson paper, yes they fed mice not rats. They still found no difference in growth rates. Measuring the composition of the feed is vital, as you want to compare GM with non-GM, not with non-GM and…and...and… Ermakova’s failure to do this makes any results impossible to interpret. As for John, he is wrong. There is a feeding protocol, there is information on what happened to the mice, there are weights and each individual was housed separately. The methods in Brake and Evenson could have more information, but the fact that John seems to think Ermakova’s study was done better is testament to his inability to look at the two studies objectively. Brake and Evenson is not perfect, Ermakova is total rubbish. Ciao Madeline.

lillian, I don’t have space to deal with all these new issues you raise. I will make one comment. You have made a number of assertions on here, about 75% of which have been easily shown to be totally wrong, extensions of reality or not out of context. Most you never defend afterwards, so I assume you accept they are not correct. Have you ever stopped to reflect on where you get this information from and why so much of it is wrong?