'GMron' - US GM testing system recipe for Enron style bio scandal - NLPWessex, 12 June 2002

'GM-ron' - Off balance sheet biotech scientific data
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Americans will no doubt be delighted to know that the Food and Drug
Administration does not regularly check GM food safety testing data provided
by biotech companies (see full articles below):

"Currently, the FDA only reviews safety data on biotech crops provided by
seed companies on a voluntary basis." (May 3, 2002, CSPI Press Release)

"The FDA said it agreed with the study’s findings but said it should not be
obliged to check data on a regular basis. The agency said the risk of
criminal penalties for submitting false data was a significant deterrent for
biotech companies, reported Reuters." (29 May 2002 just-food.com)

Yeah, Enron and Anderson were terrified of such penalties too.

Basically this means companies may submit or withold whatever data they
like.  Data can be held 'off balance sheet', Enron-style if necessary.

This process is part of a so-called regulatory system that was installed
against the advice of many of the FDA's own scientists
(see: http://www.biointegrity.org/ ).

Meanwhile a huge explosion in food related illnesses has taken place
in the US since the introduction of GM foods and nobody has found out what
is causing it. See:
http://www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/GMhealthstatistics.htm

NATURAL LAW PARTY WESSEX
nlpwessex@bigfoot.com
www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex

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IS IT POSSIBLE THAT A BIOTECH COMPANY WOULD WITHOLD INFORMATION UNDER THIS
SYSTEM? - JUDGE FOR YOURSELF

"Buried Data in Monsanto's Study on Roundup Ready Soybeans"
http://www.biotech-info.net/buried_data.html

Monsanto's genetically engineered Bovine Growth Hormone scandal
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/1527/text4.html

Revolving Doors: Monsanto and the Regulators
http://www.psrast.org/ecologmons.htm

Monsanto employees and government regulatory agencies
employees are the same people!
http://www.purefood.org/Monsanto/revolvedoor.cfm

"I was recently on a TV talk show where I debated the safety of genetically
modified food with someone representing the Food Technology Association. I
began with a brief statement on the hazards of rBGH, the synthetic
bovine-growth hormone that is now present in nearly all U.S. dairy products.
I described how, in 1989, someone dropped off at my office a batch of
documents that had been stolen from the Food and Drug Administration's files
on Monsanto, the company that manufactures  rBGH. Included was a Monsanto
document from 1987 indicating that the company was fully aware of rBGH's
danger and was conspiring with the FDA to suppress information critical to
veterinary and public health....."
From: 'An Epidemic of Deception: Why We Can't Trust The Cancer
Establishment', An Interview With Dr Samuel Epstein by Derrick Jensen,
originally published in The Sun [not the UK one!], March 2000.  In 1996,
Epstein represented the European Union at World Trade Organization talks
about the use of genetically engineered hormones in meat production. He is
currently professor emeritus of environmental and occupational medicine at
the University of Illinois School of Public Health in Chicago.
http://home.earthlink.net/~dbjensen1/epstein.html
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"Monsanto should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food. Our
interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is the
F.D.A's [Food and Drug Administration] job."
Phil Angell, Monsanto's director of corporate communications, in an
interview with the New York Times, October 25, 1998
http://www.purefood.org/monlink.html
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REGULATORY GAP MEANS GE FOODS ARRIVE ON THE MARKET WITHOUT FDA
APPROVAL AND POSSIBLY WITHOUT NOTICE
May 3, 2002
CSPI Press Release
http://www.cspinet.org/new/gefoodspr_050302.html

WASHINGTON -- Biotechnology companies can market genetically engineered
(GE) foods without notifying the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or
obtaining its approval, thanks to regulatory gaps in a system that
consumer and environmental groups today asked Health and Human Services
(HHS) Secretary Tommy Thompson to fix. HHS could begin fixing that
system, the groups say, by finalizing a rule stalled at the FDA for more
than a year. The period for public comment on the rule ended a year ago
today.

The proposed rule would require premarket notification of bioengineered
foods. And while the rule would not require government approval for GE
foods, consumer groups say the rule would be a small step in the right
direction.

The signatories of today's letter to Secretary Thompson include the
Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), Environmental Defense,
the Consumer Federation of America, the Union of Concerned Scientists,
the Institute for Environment and Agriculture, and the Whole Foods
Market grocery chain. The letter also called on Secretary Thompson and
the FDA to ask Congress to amend the current food-safety laws so that
biotech companies are required to seek approval before putting GE foods
on the market.

"Finalizing this rule should be noncontroversial, and it would improve
the current regulatory system by ensuring that FDA and the public are
notified before new biotech foods are marketed," said Gregory Jaffe,
director of CSPI's biotechnology project. "But to truly protect
consumers from any unsafe genetically engineered foods, we really need
new legislation. Only a mandatory pre-market approval process for
biotech foods will adequately safeguard our food supply."

Currently, the FDA only reviews safety data on biotech crops provided by
seed companies on a voluntary basis. In contrast, the FDA has a
mandatory approval process for GE food animals.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) also has a mandatory approval
process, including a food-safety component, but only for crops that have
pesticides engineered into them.

In 2001, two products, including a controversial Bt corn rootworm
product from Monsanto, were voluntarily reviewed by FDA without having
the benefits of the mandatory notification process.

Also, Monsanto did not consult with the FDA before it inadvertently may
have marketed a variety of GE canola. If the FDA had finalized its
proposed rule, Monsanto would have been in violation of those
regulations. Under current rules, though, Monsanto's actions were
completely legal.

"The public shouldn't have to rely entirely on the word of a big biotech
company when it comes to the safety of food," Jaffe said. "But under the
current rules, companies can bypass the FDA with impunity."

The FDA's food safety priority plan for 2002 states that the agency does
not plan to move forward with the rule at issue until 2003. "The public
should not have to wait two or more years for finalization of a
non-controversial food-safety rule," the groups wrote.
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USA: GM foods pose no additional risk to health - report

29 May 2002
just-food.com editorial team

The investigative arm of the US Congress said that genetically modified
foods pose no greater threat to health than conventionally produced foods.
[That is not what many of the FDA's own scientists said when it was setting
up the regulatory system.
Rather the FDA chose to ignore their advice as part of an admitted
governmental policy to promote biotechnology.
See:  http://www.biointegrity.org/FDADeception.html and
http://www.biointegrity.org/list.html, nlpwessex]

A study prepared for Congress by the US General Accounting Office found
that consumers of genetically modified foods are at no greater risk of
allergies or toxic reactions. Researchers found that the US Food and Drug
Administration had carried out sufficient tests on to ascertain the safety
of biotech foods before clearing them for the market. The average risk
assessment by the FDA for a new genetically modified food product takes
between 18 months and three years.

The study, which did not address the environmental impact of GM foods,
nevertheless had some recommendations for how the government could improve
its procedures. For example, the FDA should more frequently validate the
accuracy of safety data provided by food companies.

The FDA said it agreed with the study’s findings but said it should not be
obliged to check data on a regular basis. The agency said the risk of
criminal penalties for submitting false data was a significant deterrent
for biotech companies, reported Reuters.

A number of governments around the world are currently drawing up
labelling requirements to inform consumers about biotech foods. A
widespread antipathy towards genetically modified foods in Europe has not
been imitated in the US.
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"There is a profound difference between the types of unexpected effects from
traditional breeding and genetic engineering which is just glanced over in
this document.....

Unexpected Effects - This is the industry's pet idea, namely that there are
no unintended effects that will raise the FDA's level of concern. But time
and time again, there is no data to backup their contention, while the
scientific literature does contain many examples of naturally occurring
pleitropic [multi-response] effects. When the introduction of gene's into
[a] plant's genome randomly occurs, as in the case of the current technology
(but not traditional breeding) it seems that many pleiotropic
[multi-response] effects will occur. Many of these effects might not be seen
by the breeder because of the more or less similar growing conditions in the
limited trials that are performed...

.......introduced proteins (enzymes) that while acting on one specific,
intended substrate to produce a desired effect, will also affect other
cellular molecules, either as substrates, or by swamping the plant's
regulatory/metabolic system and depriving the plant of resources needed for
other things. It is not prudent to rely on plant breeders always finding
these types of changes (especially when they are under pressure to get a
product out)."

Dr. Louis Priybl of the US Food and Drug Administation Microbiology Group -
internal memorandum on FDA GM food safety testing policy document, 6 March
1992, http://www.biointegrity.org/FDAdocs/04/index.html