Roundup Tolerant GM Maize Linked To Tumor Development

New submitter spirito writes with this snippet about rats fed Roundup laced water: "The first animal feeding trial studying the lifetime effects of exposure to Roundup tolerant GM maize, and Roundup, the world's best-selling weedkiller, shows that levels currently considered safe can cause tumors and multiple organ damage and lead to premature death in laboratory rats, according to research published online today by the scientific journal Food and Chemical Toxicology. ... Three groups were given Roundup in their drinking water, at three different levels consistent with exposure through the food chain from crops sprayed with the weedkiller: the mid level corresponded to the maximum level permitted in the US in some GM feed; the lowest corresponded to contamination found in some tap waters. Three groups were fed diets which contained different proportions of NK603 – 11%, 22% and 33%. Three groups were given both Roundup and NK603 at the same three dosages. The final control group was fed an equivalent diet with no Roundup or NK603 but containing 33% of equivalent non-GM maize." The Chicago Tribune reports that not everyone's convinced of the results: "Experts not involved in the study were highly skeptical about its methods and findings, with some accusing the French scientists of going on a 'statistical fishing trip.'"

Comments

How to Attribute a Newspaper

[Electrawn]

All right, we get sick of Slashdot editor bashing, but this needs to be addressed.

The link to the Chicago Tribune is from a Reuters newsfeed. The attribution should be to Reuters, via Chicago Tribune.

For quick reference, any "feed" stories from tribune company are going to have "sns" in the title. Other papers will vary.

(From a former Tribune Co. Employee).

Re:How to Attribute a Newspaper

[Anonymous Coward]

Poor editing for comedy is really the only reason I keep coming back. Try not to spoil that.

Re:How to Attribute a Newspaper

[zero.kalvin]

I am more concerned about the original paper ( which is no where to be found ) then proper newsfeed and what not.

Re:How to Attribute a Newspaper

[dbet]

http://research.sustainablefoodtrust.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/Final-Paper.pdf

Awful headline.

[Anonymous Coward]

The headline suggests that GM corn causes cancer. This is ludicrous and only feeds the ignorant paranoid anti-GM crowd.

It's ROUNDUP exposure that's linked to tumors - NOT genetic modifications. I am not at all surprised.

I've been saying for years that there is nothing particularly risky about GM foods - it's dumping horrendous of herbicide on things that's risky... this is obvious to me, but not to the ignorant masses.

Don't give the freaks ammunition, please.

Re:Awful headline.

[binarylarry]

In other news, Monsanto has patented cancer.

Joe Baggaleducia, Monsanto Chairperson, said "Monsanto is tired of users benefiting from the use of our proprietary cancer implementation and we're going to be pressing the matter in the courts soon. We don't care if you're old, young, or dying. You will be paying your $599 Monsanto CancerPlus fee, you cock smoking tea baggers. Show me the money!"

Mr Baggaleducia then stripped naked and jumped into the giant money pit he recently had installed inside his tropical home in the Caymens. A Monsanto Spokesman was not available for comment.

Re:Awful headline.

[Znork]

Of course, since the purpose of the GM in the case of roundup resistant strains is to be able to bathe the GM plants in roundup, it could be argued that only the GM corn will give you roundup related cancer, the non-resistant corn would be dead long before you could eat it.

Re:Awful headline.

[o'reor]

Wrong. TFA says:

Researchers found that NK603 and Roundup both caused similar damage to the rats' health whether they were consumed on their own or together.

(emphasis mine)

So even without spraying Roundup on it, the GM crop increases the occurences of cancers.

Re:Awful headline.

[Nadaka]

No, the interaction of genes to the proteins that are expressed in the field is not an exact science. Fiddling with genes can and will produce unexpected changes in crops with some small number of those being potentially dangerous.

And that is not even counting the GM foods that have been intentionally modified to naturally contain pesticides.

Re:Awful headline.

[jandersen]

I've been saying for years that there is nothing particularly risky about GM foods - it's dumping horrendous of herbicide on things that's risky... this is obvious to me, but not to the ignorant masses.

Strictly speaking, we don't know whether GM food is risky; historically, there has been a long list of substances that were regarded as "obviously harmless" or even "beneficial", which none the less turned out to be harmful.

However, there is a more subtle danger: genes will eventually escape into wild plants. If, say, wheat is given this RoundUp gene, there is a large risk that this gene will spread to closely related grasses one day, and suddenly we have a wild and potetially undesirable, wild plant with resistence to RoundUp. The truth is, we know far too little about how genes transfer between species to rule out any scenario.

Or, just imagine if pharming takes off as an industry - what will happen if the genes that produce some powerful medicine somehow escape into the wild? And perhaps combine with other genes to produce effects that are completely unexpected? It would be nice if we, as a species, would sometimes look before we jump.

Re:Awful headline.

[SoulMaster]

You know, as I was RingTFA, I was trying to figure out how the reporter didn't mention Monsanto at all. Seriously, your quote is modded funny, but not including the fact that Monsanto owns (and TIGHTLY controls) both in the article seems to be a significant oversight on the part of the press.

-SM

Re:Awful headline.

[Firethorn]

In other news, Monsanto has patented cancer.

Funny, but while I agree there's a lot of evil at Monsanto, there's the problem that in many cases Roundup is LESS toxic than the alternatives if you want to get the crop yeild per acre/dollar that you can with Roundup & Roundup ready crops. It's sad, but we have limited amounts of fields and only so many resources(in dollar equivalents).

Theoretically speaking, we could feed pretty much everybody on the planet with 10% of the current planted crop areas if we switched to high density greenhouse hydroponics/aquaculture. We also wouldn't need anywhere near as much fresh water from the environment, but it would come at horrendous cost.

We could shift to non-greenhouse organic or non-roundup, but then we'd need more acres under cultivation, and it'd ultimately cost more for food. People have already rioted over food prices around the world. Actually heard on the news that they've spotted the price point at which 'global unrest' occurs. Didn't say what that price point is, but said they figured it out.

Food is serious business; we can only attempt to make food as safe as possible while still producing enough.

Re:Awful headline.

[Will.Woodhull]

I am blowing off a couple of mod points to answer this, but parent post's spin doctoring needs to be addressed.

RTFA, and you will find that the study showed a similar increase in diseases in the experimental groups that received only GM corn (no Roundup), only Roundup, and both GM corn and Roundup. With no statistical difference between the lowest dose groups and the highest dose groups. This, according to the study, suggests that both Roundup and the genetic manipulation that provides corn with protection against Roundup both interfere in the same way with some critical biochemical pathway at levels at least 100 times lower than those that are currently considered safe by the USDA, etc. The interference is described as a "threshhold effect", meaning that the presence of something in the GM manipulated corn and also in Roundup switch a pathway completely from one thing to another. This could happen, for instance, if the pathway was in the epigenetic mechanisms that turn sets of genes on and off. Some product of partial metabolism of Roundup and of the genetics that provide Roundup immunity might be throwing switches the wrong way.

One would hope that follow-up studies would explore whether the problem occurs at a specific phase of gestation or growth. Perhaps after a certain age there are no ill effects at all (the experiment was designed for whole life exposures, nothing more granular than that).

There is the possibility that the experimental design was flawed, or that some lowly lab tech was hired by agents of Treehuggers Anonymous to sabotage the work. Those possibilities appear to be vanishingly small, considering the reputations of the agencies behind the study.

There is however a relatively high probability that agents of the Monsanto Industrialized Food Complex will attempt to introduce FUD into any Slashdot discussion of the subject. Actually, irrespective of the intelligence and naievity levels of author of parent post, the probability of MIFC agents becoming active on ths Slashdot discussion approaches 1.00.

Re:Awful headline.

[dbet]

The paper

They don't go into detail about how the Roundup is exposed. In previous studies, they use adjuvants to help with delivery, which can increase toxicity. But they say nothing in this paper. They also don't control dietary intake. What if GM corn is tastier and they're eating more? Or less?

Furthermore, they observe the same health effects in the roundup group, the GM corn group, and the GM+R (both) group, AND these effects are not dose-dependent. Combine this with the small sample size, and the fact they're using a tumor-prone rat breed, you have a paper that's going to be crucified by peer review.

As of today, there is no citation for this paper by Food and Chemical Toxicity which means... I don't know. But it hasn't been published yet. Was this leaked during peer review process? This stinks and everyone should withhold judgement.

Re:Awful headline.

[Sir_Eptishous]

Meat, especially Beef is the real problem.

It's only a matter of time until the resources required to create meat get stressed to the point of pricing it out of most peoples diet. The fact that the developing world, especially China, is increasing the amount of meat in its diet will only increase the problem and quicken the change.

The American Fast Food Industrial Complex that has led the way in shaping the American diet and it's addiction to Beef will have to re-shape the American diet towards vegetarianism.

Re:Awful headline.

[o'reor]

Hah. Now that's a good question. Actually, the researcher told the french press that he had to smuggle those seeds from a canadian farming school, since Monsanto won't let anyone do any research on its plants without having total control over the outcome of the research.

After he got the seeds, I suppose he was able to grow two crops, one exposed to Roundup, and the other pesticide-free.

Re:Awful headline.

[Solandri]

It's sad, but we have limited amounts of fields and only so many resources(in dollar equivalents).

We have plenty of fields. The U.S. produces an oversupply of food each year, and has to figure out ways to get rid of the excess (foreign aid, high fructose corn syrup, cattle feed, corn ethanol). The reason is because we implemented policies to ensure overproduction, to avoid a repeat of the food shortages which followed the Dust Bowl in the 1930s. And population growth in Canada and the U.S. is less than one percent a year, trending towards zero growth. There is no need to maximize yield per acre here, just a profit incentive to do so.

The vast majority of the world's population growth is in third world countries. Developed nations all have population growth rates near zero or even negative. There's something about living in a modern post-industrialized economy which makes people want to have fewer kids. So the solution to feeding the burgeoning world population isn't to maximize yield per acre. It's to assist those third world countries in developing their economies so they too can become post-industrialized nations. If you instead concentrate on making more food, that population growth will just continue a vicious cycle of poverty and high population growth, until starvation and fighting over food finally caps it.

Re:Awful headline.

[Camaro]

I am a farmer in southern Saskatchewan, Canada. I do not, and have never worked for Monsanto or any other pesticide company. I have in fact used pesticides including some of Monsanto's glyphosate products (Roundup, Rustler and most recently RT540). Rates of application I have used range from 0.5-1.0 liters (0.13-0.26 US gallons) per acre of product mixed in 5-10 gallons of water. My use, though, is restricted to pre-seeding burnoff as I do not grow any glyphosate-tolerant crops.

Re:Awful headline.

[Protoslo]

I just read the paper, and wish I had mod points today. You are right, and your view seems very under-represented in this thread (though I am surprised that you are surprised that they released/held a press conference about a pre-print paper: even respectable researchers do that!).

The grant for the study was from CRIIGEN, a European nonprofit that exists to discredit genetically modified food: the research was certainly conceived with a conclusion already in mind. To be sure, Monsanto and others fund motivated studies of their own; this is a highly fraught and politicized area of research.

Considering the obvious bias of the researchers, I think their inability to point to any legitimate statistically significant effect of roundup or the corn is...significant. There were 9 experimental groups of 10 of each gender for a single control group, and while the food and water intake were "measured," the results of the measurements are not mentioned in the paper at all or correlated to the mortality. Instead of looking at the actual lifespan of the rats, the more dramatic binary condition of "mortality before mean life expectancy" was measured.

The vast majority of male rats died on their own, and majority of female rats were eventually euthanized due to massive tumors, something that can far more substantially be explained by the line of rat they used than by the experimental variables: they could have done a different study and as accurately declared that 80% of female rats fed only standard rat chow developed cancer. Among the 100 male rats, there was no even moderately significant result for mortality or tumors between the control and the experimental groups. Among the females, the Roundup groups showed the most tumors, but the GMO Corn + Roundup groups didn't vary significantly from the control! I don't think there is any consistent hypothesis that can adequately explain all of their results except for random variation, possibly modulated by food intake, but the researchers don't even try.

They devote a whole page to pictures of the most gross-looking rat tumors in the GM groups, and then a page to graphs of high-variation metabolic test results for the single experimental group female 33% GMO Corn v. the control. On the next page you see a table of selected blood tests between all 10 female groups, with the "significant" results highlighted. Unfortunately for the researchers, the variation is often "significant" both above and below the control group's numbers, and with no apparent correlation to the concentration of GM corn or roundup. Judging by the amount of apparent random variation between the experimental groups, there is no reason to believe that the control group's numbers represent anything like the real "mean" at all, so you would expect just what they got: a lot of variation from the control group in both directions, with some measures where it was the control group that was the outlier and thus the experimental groups are normally distributed on one side only. Just as with tumor count, the GMO+Roundup groups ironically had "better" numbers than either the groups on either GM Corn or Roundup alone.

I think that the paper can be summed up best by this rather apropos xkcd, with the difference that in this case it was the researchers themselves who made the headline. Their statistics, when even present, are crap, and they bring further discredit to the already-disreputable European anti-GM food movement. At the beginning of the paper, they claim that while glyphosate itself has been tested (negatively) for health effects, the total formulation of roundup has not, and its effects, if any, are unknown. Apparently, that condition still obtains.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[crazyjj]

Actually the economically advantaged are the ones buying the organic everything.

FTFY.

Dangerous poison.

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Analyze a dangerous poison.
2. Modify a crop's genes to be resistant against said dangerous poison
3. Treat modified crop liberally with dangerous poison
4. Have cattle eat crop treated with dangerous poison
???
6. Be amazed at what the poison does to non-resistant life forms.

Re:Dangerous poison.

[fustakrakich]

They should modify the peoples' genes, so they can eat the Roundup directly without having to bother with that silly ol' corn.

Re:Dangerous poison.

[vlm]

1. Analyze a dangerous poison.

LOL. Glyphosate kills anything that makes its own tyrosine, tryptophan and phenylalanine. People supposedly cannot synthesize it we can only eat it. Much as oxygen will kill some anaerobic bacteria, it would be a huge shock to discover oxygen causes cancer in people.

A quick "chemists glance" at the MSDS and its about as scary as rubbing alcohol... I would not drink it or wash my hands in it before eating, but I wouldn't freak out either. Everything in a chemistry lab is dangerous, you have to put it in a spectrum, and this is worse than the distilled water but pretty much obviously on the safe edge of the spectrum compared to everything else in a lab. Some of the problem is the solvents and stuff the herbicide is dissolved into to spread it around. I heard there was a court case where some PR clown called it as safe as table salt, which although technically true is misleading because your body has perfectly adequate although extremely unpleasant ways to remove a lethal salt dose from your body, unless you somehow stop it or inject it all at once. Calling it as safe as rubbing alcohol would have been about as true and less likely to get sued.

Its pretty laughable that glyphosate is a "dangerous poison". Try some organic mercury compounds if you want real danger. Its not even useful for biowarfare, not persistent enough, its highly biodegradable. Which mystifies me... so if it all degrades worst case in 100 days, and twinkie sits on the shelf for 4 months before its eaten, how is anyone eating the stuff? Yeah, I know, field to table salad without rinsing or washing, but that doesn't fit the meme of all american diets being hyper processed.

The other funny part is its use will be a footnote in history "soon". Too many resistant weeds are spreading. Why spend big bucks to apply something that'll do nothing. Why agitprop to ban something that no one will want to manufacture pretty soon, anyway?

Re:Dangerous poison.

[o'reor]

Actually, glyphosate is dangerous for plants only. However, the molecule has to find its way across the cell walls of the plant. So Monsanto added surfactant agents to break into the cells, so that the glyphosate could enter the plant. And those are *really* dangerous.

Re:Dangerous poison.

[lobiusmoop]

"it would be a huge shock to discover oxygen causes cancer in people"

Er... oxygen causes cancer in people. It's why antioxidants are popular:

Oxidative Stress

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[interkin3tic]

False dichotomy. No one is saying we must ban everything that gives you cancer.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[cplusplus]

Ever watched someone die of cancer? You might change the tune of your somewhat crazy rant if you had. The article states that "Up to 50% of males and 70% of females died prematurely" showing "2-3 times more large tumors than the control group" - which is somewhat disconcerting. If those numbers translate to what will be observed in the human population (which they probably won't, as this study was done with the upper bound tolerated limits in food, although consistent with what could be found in the food chain), then guaranteeing food for people now with the promise of a horrible premature death later doesn't sound like a good compromise.

The end is near! (Really)

[judoguy]

I have a friend that's a food researcher at a large Midwestern university. He's not opposed to Roundup per se, but rather the *massive* use of it on vast areas of monoculture.

He says that this is guaranteed to produce Roundup impervious weeds. At some point these super weeds will need very toxic chemicals to kill. The real problem is that vast areas of monoculture are unsustainable.

Nature abhors a vacuum and will fill it up with what can tolerate the environment.

Giant Ragweed

[sir_eccles]

You know what has also become Roundup resistant? Giant ragweed.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19585341

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[MightyYar]

I always enjoyed the sight of people coming out of the Union Square Whole Foods in NYC with organic groceries. Because the smog, heavy metals, and road traffic exhaust of Manhattan won't give you cancer, but that trace amount of pesticide sure will.

To be fair, they do have above-average produce.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[c]

Actually the economically advantaged are the ones who think they're buying the organic everything.

FTFY.

FTFY.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[mcgrew]

Yeah, we should ban evil pesticides! Down with evil chemicals and modern GM farming! Organic all the way!

True to your user name, I see. Nobody has sugested that all pesticides are bad or that we should return to the 19th century. You do realize that there were no tractors back then, let alone harvesters or combines?

This one strain of corn is what's under discussion, and it looks like it should be banned... if the methodology of its studies hold up. Which it looks as if they may not.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[Anonymous Coward]

The successful fight against Natural Selection is something that should be studied.

But they won't give me a grant.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[pepty]

FTA:

The article states that "Up to 50% of males and 70% of females died prematurely" showing "2-3 times more large tumors than the control group"

FT (other) A:

Tom Sanders, head of the nutritional sciences research division at King's College London noted that Seralini's team had not provided any data on how much the rats were given to eat, or what their growth rates were. "This strain of rat is very prone to mammary tumors particularly when food intake is not restricted," he said in an emailed comment. "The statistical methods are unconventional and probabilities are not adjusted for multiple comparisons. There is no clearly defined data analysis plan and it would appear the authors have gone on a statistical fishing trip."

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[similar_name]

Maybe we should start with people who destroy any chance of reasonable debate by boiling down every argument to two extremes.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[kelemvor4]

False dichotomy. No one is saying we must ban everything that gives you cancer.

I don't think anyone said it had to be banned, but labeling products that are genetically modified to be round-up resistant (and subsequently sprayed with round-up) is important in allowing consumers to make their own decisions. Currently that is not required by law and is not being done voluntarily. When you go to the store and buy products based on corn, soybeans etc you have no way to know if it's been modified or sprayed with roundup today. Unless you buy the highly expensive "organic" products. If the products were properly labeled, there could likely be some middle ground between the two.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[SomePgmr]

I'm the first to admit that I'm no expert on this stuff, but this sounds pretty damning...

Tom Sanders, head of the nutritional sciences research division at King's College London noted that Seralini's team had not provided any data on how much the rats were given to eat, or what their growth rates were.

"This strain of rat is very prone to mammary tumors particularly when food intake is not restricted," he said in an emailed comment.

"The statistical methods are unconventional and probabilities are not adjusted for multiple comparisons. There is no clearly defined data analysis plan and it would appear the authors have gone on a statistical fishing trip."

Mark Tester, a research professor at the Australian Centre for Plant Functional Genomics at the University of Adelaide, said the study's findings raised the question of why no previous studies have flagged up similar concerns.

"If the effects are as big as purported, and if the work really is relevant to humans, why aren't the North Americans dropping like flies? GM has been in the food chain for over a decade over there - and longevity continues to increase inexorably," he said in an emailed comment.

Re:Get it right

[Gideon Wells]

I think you might be wrong. Took me a few readings as the wording was a tad wonky. I believe there were four test groups:

* Round up and GM corn at three levels.
* Just round up and normal corn at three levels.
* Normal water and GM corn at three levels.
* Control - Tap and normal corn.

The article claims only the control group was healthy.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[dbet]

Then we better ban sunlight.

Calling Mr. Burns!

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[kelemvor4]

Ever watched someone die of cancer?

Ever watched someone starve to death?

Oh no, of course you haven't. Because, thanks to GM crops and pesticides and the vastly improved crop yields they've provided, food today is plentiful in the developed world.

Not that it didn't happen, but can you cite a reference to a time when food was not plentiful in the developed world. I'm honestly curious. I know there are plenty of places in the world where folks are starving, but I've never heard of there being a food shortage in my country (USA) during my lifetime.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[kelemvor4]

In that case I think banning GM foods would have a much smaller impact that you suppose. Commercial sale of genetically modified foods began in 1994 (source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetically_modified_food ). Not that I'm suggesting they need to be banned. I'm for mandatory labeling of products and detailed government sponsored scientific studies on the topic. If the problem was eliminated (or significantly reduced) before 1994, then GM crops and round-up did not play a role.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[sjames]

The same strain of rat was used in the controls and fed the same way (just a different variety of corn) and didn't get the tumors.

Re:Did they study the health effects of starving?

[gardenermike]

Way, way off. The numbers are more like a 30% decrease in yields, based on current farming methods. Considering that we haven't applied science to organic farming like we have to chemical farming, due to easy postwar chemical availability, the gap could probably be closed even more. Yes, conventional farms have marginally higher productivity. But you are off by an order of magnitude with your "5x" claim.