Would you eat GM rice containing human genes?
The response to this in GNTIS-run workshops is predictable, so maybe that is the question Greenpeace asked everyone to achieve their figure of 90% of Australians reject GM food. The workshops, however, reveal a very different and contradictory picture.
The launch of Greenpeace’s True Food guide at the Sydney Food Festival this week on the coat-tails of some serious food and political celebrities got a lot of media attention. If you read the stories you might be convinced that 90% of Australians (according to Greenpeace) don’t want to eat GM food. But the picture is more complicated than that and workshops I run exploring the ethics of GM food and the associated technologies contradict these generalised – often misleading, even meaningless – opinion polls.
So I want to take you on an interesting three-year adventure I have had running workshops for some interesting people and groups who have delved beyond the standard for and against arguments about GM crops, subjected themselves to self-scrutiny and horrified themselves about their ancestral links with plants and other critters.
I have conducted these workshops for teachers, secondary students, Rotary clubs U3A (University of the Third Age – very cool bunch of people too), and other community groups such as gardening and naturalist clubs, enough groups and people to reveal an established pattern about our thoughts on GM foods and the technologies behind them. There was consistency in their response regardless of the group and age and, as mentioned, it contradicts most of the basic opinion polls about public attitudes to this technology.
The caveat here is that there was not a scientifically robust methodology attached to how I conducted these workshops, nor in the collection or analysis of the data, so there needs to be a grain of caution in what I about to tell you. Next year I hope to conduct these workshops in a methodically robust way and get data that means you can dispense with much of that caution.
So would you eat rice genetically modified with human genes – two to be precise? If you are like nearly all workshop participants, your answer will be no. Or to put it in the context of how I ask the question you will find it an unacceptable way to use this technology. This is an expected and reasonable response. The interesting stuff comes out when you explore why and how this compares to their responses to other examples of GM crops.
As part of the introductory talk the workshop participants learnt the basics of DNA. I put up a slide with the info below to illustrate that all living things have DNA and that all DNA is made of the same stuff.
All living things share at least some genes.
Based on your genes, this is how related you are to….
•A chimpanzee: 96%
•A mouse: 80%
•A fruit fly: 66%
•A cabbage: about 40%
Then I ask people to place themselves on what I call the morality line. One end is the acceptable the other unacceptable based on how acceptable you find the use of the technology to create a specific GM food or crop.
We look at four examples: Rice modified to contain vitamin A or iron; a pest-resistant (Bt) cotton; cereal crops modified to be drought tolerant, and finally rice modified with human genes.
For a start I want their gut reaction so the only information they have about the crop is what is above. Then we explore the various arguments, concerns and thoughts people have and why they have them, and along the way I explain more about the crop and how/why it was developed. It is a great way for people to see different perceptions and what is driving them.
The initial gut reaction for the first two examples will see a spread across the morality line slightly leaning toward the acceptable end, though usually with a small bulge in the middle for the fence-sitters. As we explore the arguments, issues and concerns, many people will change their position on the line; some toward the acceptable end, others go the opposite direction. A person’s position on the line for one example is not indicative of where they will be for the next example. They will and do change. There are various reasons, but the underlying reason for all is that a person will suddenly find the risks more acceptable or less from one crop to the other.
When presented with the drought-tolerant example, nearly all, especially the students, moved to the acceptable end. When asked what distinguishes this crop from the others, the most common answer is that we have climate changes and serious drought and whatever risks exist they are acceptable in this situation.
Now what about ‘humanised rice’?
As mentioned, with the exception of a few mavericks, nearly all participants wedge themselves as far toward the unacceptable end as possible for this example. Why are they here? Why is this so different to the other crops? Without even being there you could guess that it is the use of human genes as the obvious cause. It is a line we shouldn’t cross apparently. Cannibalism is the frequent association.
Then I explain that the two human genes in the rice code for antimicrobial proteins found in our saliva and tear ducts and that these proteins are to be extracted and used as a drug to treat dysentery and related diseases. It will not be grown as a food. About half will move to the acceptable side with that news. Again why the move: because we don’t have to eat it; because it is a drug that will help people…and similar sentiments.
But we do still have to eat it, if we take it as a drug. Ah, but to varying degrees we nearly all draw a distinction between the technology being used for medical purposes and it being used for food production.
And for the others still stuck up the unacceptable end. Why are you still here, I ask? There is still the same, quite rational, psychological hurdle of the fact it is human genes. So, I try and throw spanner in the spokes by suggesting that they ingest 25,000 human genes whenever they kiss someone, share a drink bottle, or simply shake someone’s hand. In the rice example, you are only consuming the protein products of the genes and then only two of them. So what is the difference? You share about 30-40% of your genes with a cabbage. Does this mean you are going to excise the percentage of your cabbage, or any other vegetable, that contains human genes before you eat it?
There will be a couple that might move to the fence-sitting position, but on the whole this is one big psychological hurdle for people. “It is doing my head in,” was one comment from a woman from a gardening club. Her rational brain was at war with her intuitive or instinctive brain and it was getting bloody.
The key points that come from these workshops, however, is that you can’t say 90% of people won’t eat GM food, because we don’t think like that. We naturally assess each crop and make a judgment about its acceptability, a judgement that will differ from one crop to the next. That judgment, for nearly all people, is not based on the technology itself, but on the crop and its purpose. That is, we judge how acceptable we find the risks when weighed against the perceived benefits. And everyone judges risk differently.
Company producing the GM rice – Ventria Bioscience
Jason Major
Aust-NZ examination of food labelling laws
Ministers responsible for food issues in Australia and New Zealand will set up a panel to undertake a comprehensive, year-long examination of food labelling law and policy, which could include GM foods.
The Council of Australian Governments (COAG) has agreed that the Australia and New Zealand Food Regulation Ministerial Council (the Ministerial Council) undertake a comprehensive review of food labelling law and policy using an evidence based approach and without compromising public health and safety.
Matters for Review
The review panel will be required to:
Examine the policy drivers impacting on demands for food labelling.
Consider what should be the role for government in the regulation of food labelling. What principles should guide decisions about government regulatory intervention?
Consider what policies and mechanisms are needed to ensure that government plays its optimum role.
Consider principles and approaches to achieve compliance with labelling requirements, and appropriate and consistent enforcement.
Evaluate current policies, standards and laws relevant to food labelling and existing work on health claims and front of pack labelling against terms of reference 1-4 above.
Make recommendations to improve food labelling law and policy.
More information and terms of reference at FSANZ
Rot-resistant wheat found
CSIRO researchers have identified wheat and barley lines resistant to Crown Rot – a disease that costs Australian wheat and barley farmers $79 million in lost yield every year.
CSIRO Plant Industry: http://www.csiro.au/news/Rot-resistant-wheat-could-save-farmers-millions.html
Finding genes and molecular markers associated with resistance and susceptibility to the Fusarium fungus
Nano utopia is nigh – apparently.
A US research engineer says nanotechnology can place us on the path to freedom and happiness for all – or mostly all. Will society choose to take this path, however?
Technology, especially the latest emerging technologies, are supposed to make things easier and in many cases they do. But Tihamer Toth Fejel in Nanotech Now has put nanotechnology up there as the path to freedom and happiness for all – or mostly all.
His claim is that once we get over a couple of technological hurdles the exponential nanomanufacturing capabilities of what he calls the Productive Nanosystems will produce atomically precise products that will dramatically change the world. For example, Productive Nanosystems will reduce economic dependency to a square meter of dirt and the sunshine that lands on it.
Productive Nanosystems, he says, will mean redefining poverty and what we consider the dysfunctions in our society. Wish I guess begs the question what is happiness? If I have interpreted Fejel’s correctly, then Productive Nanosystems will allow nearly, if not all, people to control (or manufacture) our desires so, by our own definition, we can be happy.
Summer Johnson , in a post on The American Journal of Bioethics blog, finds these claims hard to swallow, and to a large extent I agree, though I admit Fejel’s commentary is lengthy, deep and complicated by economics and political implications that are beyond my expertise (and interest), so I may have mis-interpreted a lot of what he says. Society is a complex beast and the technologies Fejel mentions will likely all be possible (many in my lifetime), but how we decide to apply them is difficult to know – but fun to speculate about nonetheless.
Jason Major
GM squash has unintended environmental consequences
New research indicates that GM virus-resistant squash may have unintended consequences for the squash and its wild relatives. Does it really matter and are the risks any bigger for conventional crops with similar traits?
GM squash has unintended environmental consequences
New research published in the PNAS this week indicates that GM squash engineered to be resistant to debilitating viruses may have unintended consequences on the fitness of the squash and its wild relatives, should it outcross with them. See link on GNTIS site
In a nutshell, the research found that cucumber beetles, a pest of squash, much prefer to munch on healthy squash plants as opposed those riddled with virus, which means if virus is present the GM squash will the preferred option for these beetles. Trouble is these beetles have a habit of delivering bacterial wilt disease to the squash, which can affect the quality of the crop.
That is one unintended consequence. The other is the unknown effect it might have in the environment, should the transgene (the virus-resistant gene inserted into the GM squash) get into the wild relatives of the squash, which the researchers think may have already happened.
The implications of this on the environment outside the well-tended paddock (field) is unknown as pointed out by the paper’s authors: “a full understanding of the combined effect of these forces on the fitness of an escaped transgene may not be apparent without the context of the complete ecological community.”
Should their research hold up to scrutiny its will be interesting to see how it affects future research and regulation. This will be especially relevant to Australian research trying to develop transgenic cereals and pastures that are resistant to drought, frost, salinity and other abiotic stresses. But as part of this research, it is necessary to find out if there are any wild relatives that such grasses or crops might cross with as as indigenous species suddenly endowed with the ability to withstand salinity might see it encroach into new and unwanted environments.
OK, checking this out before releasing such crops commercially is just sensible science. But the there is also considerable research going on to develop the same traits in crops using non-GM methods. The risk is the same that these crops may transfer their stress-related genes to indigenous species with the same environmental implications. Should we regulate the breeding of all crops in a similar fashion? What if the transgenic squash in question had been developed by conventional means, would anyone have bothered to do the research to see if it transferred it virus-resistant genes to wild populations?
Jason Major
More gene therapy success in restoring sight
An experimental gene therapy has boosted fading vision in 12 patients with a single treatment.
Science Daily: http://www.newsdaily.com/stories/tre59n1t4-us-blindness-genetherapy/
Discovery of gene that ‘cancer-proofs’ rodent cells
The cells of the naked mole rat, the only known cancerless animal, express a gene that stop cell growth when they get too crowded, cutting off cancer before it can start.
University of Rochester: http://www.rochester.edu/news/show.php?id=3479
Modified crops reveal hidden cost of resistance
Genetically modified squash plants that are resistant to a debilitating viral disease become more vulnerable to a fatal bacterial infection, according to biologists.
Penn State University: http://live.psu.edu/story/42497/rss49
Prof. Andrew Stephenson, Penn State: There is concern that when the transgenes that confer resistance to these viral diseases escape into wild populations, they will (change) those plants. That could impact the biodiversity of plant communities where wild squash are native.
Finding appear in 26 October Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
New evidence for toxic effects of inhaled nanotubes
Further evidence for the asbestos-like effects of carbon nanotubes has emerged from a new study in mice.
RSC Chemistry World: http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/News/2009/October/25100901.asp
Nanowire biocompatibility in the brain
For the first time scientists have injected ‘nanowires’ in rat’s brains with no ill effects, opening the door to treatments for diseases such as depression and Parkinsons.