Dangers Of GM Food Revealed

I have been against genetically modified food ever since it was first mentioned back in the 1990's. Not only did it sound unhealthy but it was one of those situations where if any contamination of the countryside occurred, it would be impossible to put the genie back in the bottle if a decade down the line it turned out that GM crops were unsafe after all.
America seem much more relaxed about GM food, a study by the International Food Information Council shows that 77% of Americans would be likely to buy products that had been genetically engineered which is lucky considering that 76% of the American soybean crop was GM, as well as 32% of its corn.
Monsanto is the largest GM seed seller in the World and there has been a few controversies surrounding them including widespread bribery of government officials and former Monsanto employees holding positions in US government agencies such as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
A major contributor to the Republican Party, George W Bush blasted the restriction of genetically modified foods into the European Union where the vast majority of the public reject the idea of our food being tinkered with genetically. Wikileaks cables showed that American diplomats urged Washington to punish European countries that opposed the growth of genetically modified crops, even pressuring the Pope to announce his backing for the technology to 'influence a wide segment of the population in Europe and the developing world’.
Big business GM food and Europe has stubbornly refused to accept it while America embraces it but a report from the Health & Safety Agency of the French government may leave a bitter taste in the mouth and a little something much more nastier elsewhere.
French scientists have revealed that rats fed on GM corn sold by American firm Monsanto, suffered tumours and other complications including kidney and liver damage.
"Based on the conclusion, the government will ask the European authorities to take all necessary measures to protect human and animal health, measures that could go as far as an emergency suspension of imports of NK603 maize in the European Union," the French health, environment and farm ministries said in a joint statement.
Researchers from the University of Caen found that rats fed on a diet containing NK603 – a seed variety made tolerant to amounts of Monsanto's Roundup weedkiller – or given water mixed with the product, at levels permitted in the United States – died earlier than those on a standard diet.
The research conducted by Gilles-Eric Seralini and his colleagues, said the rats suffered mammary tumours, as well as severe liver and kidney damage.
Fifty percent of male and 70 percent of female rats died prematurely, compared with only 30 percent and 20 percent in the control group, said the researchers.
In the wake of the publication, Jose Bove, vice-chairman of the European Parliament’s commission for agriculture, called for an immediate suspension of all EU cultivation and import authorisations of genetically modified crops.
Hopefully this report will be shouted loud and long and the debate over GM foods will now be closed down for good and while we would have dodged the bullet over here, over there in America, it must be a worry about what they have been eating, what the cost to their health may be and why their Governments have been so easily persuaded to force an untested product on them.