Focus 580; Public Perceptions and the Safety of Biotechnology

On the program in this first hour we will revisit a topic we've discussed before and not in a while though and that is we'll be talking about genetically modified crops and GM food and what we know at this point about these crops their potential environmental impact their impact on human health. There continues to be a fair amount of concern about both of those issues out there. A lot of people in in this country a significant number of people in this country and around the world are concerned about these foods. So we have as our guest someone who is used to talking about these issues. Our guest is Bruce chassis. He is the associate executive director of the campus biotechnology center here at University of Illinois. He is also assistant dean for biotechnology and outreach in the college of aces. That stands for agricultural consumer and environmental sciences. And he is professor of food micro biology by academic training he is a chemist. He has a Ph.D. and biochemistry from Cornell. He worked as a research chemist for the National Institute of dental research at the National

Institute of Health for 21 years before he came to the U of Ike to head the Department of Food sciences. After that department was merged with the division of foods and nutrition he was appointed head of the Department of Food Science and human nutrition and had that job until last May when our May of last year when he took the job that he has now. He's been good enough to come over and spend some time talking with us and we're pleased to have him as guest. Questions comments certainly are welcome all we ask of people is that you try to be brief just so we can keep things moving along and get in as many different people as possible but anyone certainly welcome to call the number here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. We also have a toll free line good anywhere that you can hear us and that is eight hundred to 2 2 9 4 5 5 at any point. You can certainly feel free should feel free to pick up the phone and give us a call. Well thanks very much for being here. Glad to be here. The the issues around GM crops get a fair amount of press and certainly there's been a lot of discussion in media about them. At

the same time one wonders just how many in terms of public interest and concern on that issue. How many people are concerned about GM crops and certainly the people who are seem to be pretty vocal. But if you look at the general population. Why are there surveys that say where they've actually gone on people and asked people well you know are you concerned about these would you buy a genetically modified product. Are you buying genetically modified product. Do you have any idea if you're buying genetically modified products and that may be a key question what generally do people do we think people think about that. Well those are all great questions and in keeping with us being maybe the most surveyed people in the world. There are surveys on each one of those questions by a number of different organizations. I wish I'd been writing writing down and keeping track. And let me let me say and I think people do survey research really understand this that how you ask the question and whether it's open ended or not has a

terrific effect on what kind of answer you get if you simply walk up to the average American consumer and say what if anything concerns you about safety in the American food supply. Nobody will mention biotechnology perhaps in some surveys one or two percent but people actually rather correctly know that it's food borne illness that they have to worry about contamination by microbes. And that's a big change in the last 15 years people would have said that 15 years ago. But we've had all of the press about e-coli salmonella and stuff like that. So we're starting we're starting to get you know on target. Now if you ask people on the other hand are they eating biotech foods today. Only about 40 percent of the people in this country understand that for the last four or five years we've had you know biotech soybeans biotech corn we had a flavor saver tomato there were a number of crops. And you know it's funny because that's been in the news plate papers certainly been no secret. And in fact some of the biotech companies have had great

hoopla and maybe Eurus about how they've got these great new products out there and by and large consumers have ignored that I think because it's not really meaningful to them. They don't see any change in their food the products were designed to be identical and they are identical and so it really hasn't been very remarkable. Another kind of question you can ask is What if anything have you changed about your eating habits in the last year or in the last three months. And when you asked that question. Again biotech never comes up. On the other hand if you ask people whether they want biotech to be labeled They will say yes. Consumers want everything to be labeled. I think most of us want full information about everything so you know that's not a surprise. But in a nutshell in a finance you know the questions what they're seeing. Yeah there there seem to there seems to be a case still small but growing number of people who are more interested in organic products who seem to be inclined to buy them sometimes even if they're more expensive.

And that this seems to be a sort of a component of that if what does anybody know what would happen indeed if we got to the point where GM products were labeled as such. How that would affect people's buying choices. Or would you know how many people would just not pay any attention to that and would just go right ahead and buy what they would have bought anybody anyway. And how many people particularly want you call their attention to the fact that it is might they then actually pay more attention to it than they would have otherwise. Great question that's been surveyed at least twice in the last year. The International Food Information Council and the Center for Science in the public interest have both looked at that with the Center for Science in the public interest survey found was that most Americans would consider a label. But that said GM are produced through biotechnology. We consider that a health warning. And the International Food Information Council

survey asked the question in such a way that the answer that they got back was 47 percent of American consumers would not buy a product with such a label until they were given more information. Well obviously the people who who process and manufacture food don't want something on there that would discourage people from buying the product. The whole issue of labeling has been somewhat controversial. Where where now do we stand in this conversation about whether or not if if there's genetically modified product in a particular food or we're just talking about the food itself you are talking about a tomato or we're talking about a you know a bag of Fritos or something like that. Whether or not it should say that on there. Well let me let me get you to back up a bit and let's do a little definitions you know we been throwing around the term genetically modified products what exactly do we mean by that. We have courses use

enzymes in preparing food we have laundry detergent enzymes. They're used in metal etching I mean just all these applications many of them are engineered by bio technology. We have a number of pharmaceuticals and drugs that are produced by biotechnology genetically modified. We're even talking about using plants to produce pharmaceuticals and high value proteins for medicine and human health. And then we get to biotech foods and we and we still say well these are genetically modified. But the fact is that each one of them is an individual and it has unique properties it has unique environmental concerns unique consumer and concerns unique food safety concerns. So one of the things that those of us who work in the field try to do is get people to think about these things on a one by one basis. What are the issues with BT corn for example. What are the issues with the Roundup Ready soybeans rather than lumping them all together under biotechnology. It is very clear that there are number of people the world over who

have misgivings about this technology and those can be political they can be social they could be ethical It could be economic you know they could be opposed to world trade. In general all of those people like to talk about biotechnology or genetically modified plants or foods in a big lump. They're all one thing and really they're all bad as far as they're concerned. And the other side of it those of us in science in the regulatory system are compelled to look at them one by one and say is this particular application of the technology good or bad does it have an acceptable risks or does it have overwhelming benefits. So. I know of course I've forgotten the original question. Well I think it's important to make that distinction. The question was about labeling as a way you know whether where something that's been discussed and you know I'm sort of interested obviously interest groups may have one position the FDA may have a position that part of

agriculture may have a position the the Congress may have a position I'm just sort of watching where we are with this whole issue of whether or not that and food producers I'm sure they have a position. Is there any sort of consensus about what should you know what kind of information should be on the product. Well you know that's exactly the problem is what should be on the product. We know that if you simply say that it's genetically modified that's a negative for people. And in fact in a it's important recognize that most countries in the world have elected to label because they believe that the consumer right to know is more important then any possible negatives from putting a rather meaningless label on the Center for Science in the public interest who normally is very strong advocate for consumer rights says they're not so sure that labeling would mean anything to a consumer they would interpret it as a as a health warning which is there's no evidence that there are in fact any safety or health concerns. And how would a

consumer interpret that given. And this is why I mention that each one of these things is distinct. The concerns you would have with a Roundup Ready soybean are really different than the concerns you would have with Starlink corn. Very very different kinds of concern So what label do you put on there. You put a label saying this product may contain some ingredients because remember when we eat it corn we don't really usually eat corn wheat starch that comes from corn wheat oil that comes from corn We oil it comes from soybeans. Many of these things are processed in doing gradients that may have 20 or 30 different ingredients into a mixture that some food manufacturer buys and they put in their product. So they may not even know whether they come from genetically modified so it becomes very complex and there is no way to give a consumer meaningful information. And I think the FDA here has said using a broad brush and saying genetically modified is a sort of a political statement that doesn't relate to either safety or consumer information I mean basically we put labels on things to avoid fraud or

misrepresentation and to warn consumers if there are safety concerns. On the other hand the FDA has said. Hear that if you substantially change a product if I change the composition of a soybean or I change the composition of corn I can't sell that as corn. I have to put a label on that because what's meaningful to the consumer is that compositional changes that is no longer the same product. So we actually have a labeling law that says Biotech has to be labeled. If it changes something the rest of the world says we don't we don't care if anything's changed. It's just got to be labeled. Well then that comes to the question of what do we consider a change and whether it has to be labeled or not. Because I suppose some people would say well soybeans soybean other people would say well but if we change the altered the genetic makeup of this I mean it's not what it was before it's something that didn't even exist before it's brand new. Right on. I mean that is exactly the problem. And I think you said it very well. What you consider a change determines on which side of the line you come down in. And you know you've got to be fair to the people who are concerned about this technology.

They see that insertion of a gene as a substantial material change and do not consider it the same thing. And to them that wouldn't qualify say as organic food wouldn't be anything they'd want to eat. And. You know consumers make choices that aren't driven by logic or science necessarily. We're allowed to have emotional reactions to foods we're allowed to have preferences and if you just don't like biotech foods because you think that's a change you don't want to accept there's no way that you're wrong. You're the one making the purchase and consuming the food. That's your choice and that's the dilemma with the with the labeling issue. We have held that the products that are on the market so far we being the FDA in our regulatory system are in fact not materially different because you can analyze for every known constituent you can do chemical and bio chemical determinations and you can show that there are no changes in the soybean that are measurable or no changes in the corn that are measurable. I heard someone from one Santa the other day said that they had they had done 300000 compositional analyses on different varieties of their

biotech corn and every one of them fell within the range of normal for some 50 ingredients. Well to them obviously that's no change. But if you're looking at the one gene they put in and you're saying well that's different and I don't want to eat it. Then we have a dilemma. So I guess though the bottom line at this point is we still haven't decided how really we want to deal with this. That's correct sometimes I think the easiest way to deal with this is to put may contain genetically modified ingredients on everything. That's in the normal food supply and move on and let those people who don't want to eat those kinds of products do much as they've had to do today which is to resort to organic foods you know a lot of people have misgivings about biotechnology have misgivings about other aspects of the safety and nutritional value of our food supply and you know that's not what this program is about and you've had discussions of organic and Whole Foods and you know natural foods on this program before. But if

you're in that category where you're you don't feel your safety is being regulated sufficiently by the government or that you don't feel that the mass produced foods that we get in the supermarket are providing you and your family proper nutrition. And it doesn't come as any surprise to me that biotech falls outside your realm of interest and that you would you know avoid it. Well we have several callers now. We want to get to them and we'll get them in the order they came in and I just wish you'd though introduce Again our guest We're speaking with Bruce chassis. He is a professor of food microbiology at the University of Illinois he's also associate executive director of the campus biotechnology center. And we're trying to do a review of some of what we know at this point about how people think about biotech foods. What we know about their potential health impacts we may get into some environmental issues as well whatever's on your mind. You can certainly call in and you know the press Jassi will give you the best response that he can. 3 3 3

9 4 5 5. We also have a toll free line good anywhere you can hear us. 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 the first caller is in Champaign County and that will be the Line 1. Well I I I only have a moment I'd like to go on for a while because it is a complicated issue but it's interesting to note that the spin on the first part of the story is basically this is a PR problem. And I'm critical of GM foods and I think they're calling them frankenfood shows you where it's coming from it's it's basically. Distrust of science which I think is warranted to some extent because the modern age is full of great advances by science but there are a lot of unintended consequences that science has wrought on people that makes them suspicious. And I think that the most persuasive arguments I have about and I've heard about GM foods is not so much maybe the effect of directly on the people but there are a lot of problems like well BT corn BT potatoes

What do we do when that you know widespread indiscriminate use of of this this toxin creates organisms insects that are no longer affected by it. Well we need to escalate and Monsanto needs to sell another another product and it's got to serve its own. Obsolescence built into it which is maybe a great long range corporate strategy but it's not good for I think in the long run the health of the earth. Actually I think that I'm all for research I just am very suspicious of all of the corporate and peer reviewed. And this might be something that you can actually agree with me on research that's going on I'd rather see it go on and institutes in an academia where there is more and more peer review and there's more. I think attention more likely to be attention to to long term consequences rather than the short term bottom line. So that's my general statement I just. Also people are not against world

trade as you kind of glibly and I suppose that's just a conversational advice but I think a lot of people believe that people are against world trade. That does not help anybody but the corporations exploitative jobs in Malaysia don't help a worker in South Carolina. They undercut his price and they don't help the worker particularly though you'll hear arguments to the contrary and that is and also another subject but I just it's just easy to say that people are against world trade. Without saying that that's you people say that people are against globalization when they're against corporate globalization where the values and the goals of the globalization are determined by by elites and are not. You know democratically reviewed and that sort of thing anyway I hope some other people will join in the argument. OK I got you and I'll listen to the first examples are very good thanks for the call.

Let's one we maybe agree to leave that point aside because I think it's as the caller points out I think that's another show. The first two points the caller raises give us enough that we could talk about them for the rest of the time almost. But I'm interested in your comments about that. The first point is again it's one that a lot of people have made as what have we've taken this this new quote unquote natural pesticide that a lot of organic producers use bacillus the rain chances and we built it into the plant and the question is what happens if we plant more wall to wall in this country. Plants that have this we can expect within a relatively short period of time that we would suddenly find that the insects are now resistant to bacillus there in Genesis means it won't be good to anybody the organic producers will be able to use it anybody nobody will be able to use it anymore. And the only people that ultimately will benefit are the people who will come along and make whatever the next thing is going to be. What about that.

Well there's certainly something to it because from the very beginning of evaluating these technologies from an agricultural and environmental point of view the scientists for the EPA and the scientists for the companies and university scientists all got together and thought about resistance management because it is in fact as the caller points out a likelihood that if you keep using high levels. Any pesticide indiscriminately you are going to get resistant organisms selected insects or are quite good at doing this and in fact we already know with BT the insecticide of protein used in biotech corn that that's going to happen because BT has been used for over 40 years in organic agriculture and in forestry and it's a very effective insecticide control. It's actually one of the few they have in organic agriculture. But one of the consequences of the previous use of BT

in a non biotech way is that we know that you can select resistant organisms specifically the Western Diamondback more MAF has. Their resistant variants out there because of the conventional use of BT. So a management scheme had to be put in place with these new plants. I'd like to suggest to the caller a nother way of looking at this while it's possible. Planned obsolescence is a good thing for a company given the multi-billion million dollar investment it takes to develop one of these new biotech products. Keeping their intellectual property in play and being able to use a biotech corn for example for as many years as possible is actually in the best interests of the company because there isn't in fact necessarily a whole shelf full of alternatives for them. And they're trying to guard those alternatives. Now I you know I don't know which actually plays out but what I do know is that the EPA requires the company to show that they have a resistance management scheme which

includes a refuge of 20 percent of the crop is non biotech and that's supposed to wash out any resistant insects. But I think that the overruling overriding important point is that there is post market surveillance. Every year fields are surveyed for the presence of resistant insects and that management scheme has to be changed if resistances is cropping up and these products may have to be taken off the market in certain places. If resistance becomes a problem. And that's just the rules of the game. So it's a real issue. Ok well and then let's try to talk a bit about the other point I think that the concern has been raised by some folks that the the amount of money that the federal government has to test the kinds of products we're talking about is wholly inadequate to the task and that we are relying primarily on the manufacturers to do the testing. And for them to tell us that these products are safe.

True not true and is that somehow we should worry about. Yeah absolutely true. Well I don't know if we should worry about it but it's absolutely true. I think the speaker has a good point here. You shouldn't find it surprising his university faculty member that I believe that we should have more federal funding for doing independent evaluative research not because I think that there is any problem with that with the data that companies have provided In fact I haven't seen any evidence of. You know any any kind of impropriety or irregularity in companies producing data it's in fact the way our regulatory system works in this and most other countries is that when a company wants to put any kind of product or technology that's regulated on the market they provide the data and the government regulators decide whether they believe it or not that's just our paradigm. And I haven't seen that there's anything wrong with that. But you know I agree with with the caller that good peer reviewed science that corroborates and extends and maybe looks at things that a company wouldn't look at it necessarily have in a more holistic systemwide way as we're able to do it the university would be a great idea and I have been an

advocate and I hope some of the people who oppose this technology you know would advocate for getting more government funding. Again not because there is a problem but because it's a good way to avoid having a problem with the data. OK. We are at our midpoint already and we are talking here this morning with Bruce chassis as I said He's professor of food microbiology at University of Illinois he also is the associate executive director of the campus biotechnology center. And we're very happy to take questions comments whatever people's on people's minds or something that we need to do here real quick something that we do every month. This is a test of the Emergency Alert System. The CS focus 580 or telephone talk program My name's David Inge. Glad to have you with us this morning.

We have some of the callers here but before we go on I think you did want to respond to another of the comments of the first caller perhaps because you felt that either you had you had said something you didn't really intend to say or perhaps were misunderstood and on the. The global trade issue you know well you know I think the first caller suggested that I believe this was a perception problem or a spin problem of some kind. I think it's much more fundamental and that I certainly didn't mean to say that you know and I don't think it's an advertising or education or an advertising or marketing kind of problem either because you know I think it really is an information problem. And you know with with regard to global trade. I think biotechnology is has become a lightning rod for a number of issues that we really need to be talking about and having a dialogue about. The caller referred to having an argument on the subject. I don't have an argument I won't have a dialog where we can constructively move forward. And some of those issues are you know food safety issues and environmental safety

issues certainly have to be thought of but you know corporate control and concentration is an issue. There are ethical implications of using this technology that concern some people. There are issues about consumer choice and what consumers have a right to know or should know. There's a question about distribution of benefits versus risks. Who's benefiting here and and you know who's taking the risk. And finally there is this globalization and trade issue and biotechnology is just a small part about that but those are all important issues that we need to get straight As a society and in no way do I want to belittle them. People come from different points of view to the biotechnology discussion and with different things on their mind obviously. Well perhaps you know if I don't know if I had started the discussion with a different question we might have been at a different point at this point and I guess I don't know that I had a particular agenda in raising those points. But I guess what is fair to say at least is my perception though that a lot of people within the biotech industry community do indeed feel that this is a public relations issue and if they had started out trying to persuade people that turn to his word

consumers that this technology would benefit them. Rather than the perception that I think got out there was that well mostly it was there maybe to benefit farmers and it and to help them control their input costs and didn't necessarily end up with a better food product and maybe didn't necessarily even ended up with greater yields. Just cutting down on production costs for farmers. That the bottom line really didn't mean much of anything to consumers. I think that people in industry think you know if we if we had spun this differently at the beginning we wouldn't have there would be such a negative perception of these products. You know I think there's some of that I've heard that I think you described it very well. I think there's another element in industry who believes had we had more of a dialogue and more good information you know there's a difference between education information and spinning things. And I think I think there are some in industry who have finally realized that it's a lot bigger than in issue than they thought it

was. I think in a way they got blindsided a little bit maybe they talked themselves into this but they felt the changes they were making were very innocuous. And that the since the composition was the same it was no big deal and in fact the very first product the flavor saver tomato was supposed to be an obvious consumer benefit. A tomato that tasted more vine ripened didn't. But that specific point it was a great idea. So yeah that may have loaned them into a false sense of security especially since all of this appeared in the newspaper. And so you know they thought they had this great technology. If you're in the private sector and you have a product you advertise a product I mean you you know you talk positively about your product and you don't look for problems with consumer acceptance. And I think they're probably quite surprised. But on the other hand it's taken a lot of work to make this a issue for a lot of people. The people that oppose the technology have spent a lot of money a lot of time a lot of effort to clearly frame their issues and get their message across

to the consumer. Given the low level of information that people have and the low level of awareness that people have in general about biotech frankly it's surprising given the amount of effort that the people are concerned about the technology have put into basically trying to get the consumer to reject the technology. Most consumers today would not reject the technology would not be concerned about it were it not for the efforts of people who have voiced concerns. And I'm not sure that the industry. Could have seen in advance that the advocacy against the technology would be as effective or spar reaching as it's been. Well let's talk with some of the folks who go to a champagne color here this line too. Hello. Well I'm not sure I quite buy that last argument but what I wanted to go back to the issue of labeling that you raised initially and whether or not there was a substantial change in I would say that

despite whatever public rhetoric or rhetoric the corporations might use the mere fact that they think they've changed it enough that they have you know a right to patent something is prime aphasia evidence in and of itself that there's a substantial change. It sounds like the really strong argument but I think it's a point of view. No argument with that. OK well I you know I just think that you know Truth in Advertising is a good thing and you know I think it's better to have more information people can make their choices. The idea that you know corporations can just foist things off on us and you know have docile consumers. I think that you know educate consumers a good thing. I absolutely agree with that. No problem. All right. Let's go to another champagne color this is a line three fellow and I'd like to mention a few things and then have you respond on please

afterwards. First you mentioned earlier in your program that no one mentions biotech concern with a survey. Partly it is because the information is being withheld from us here in this country and the information on E.coli and other things is not being withheld from us. So it's not that we're ignoring it or that we have an opinion that's not too concerned it's the fact that we're uninformed because essentially our press right now which is owned by a handful of corporations is censoring the information we're getting. A point in case. Is this that Arpad pushed by in the United Kingdom. Did some research in 1998 in Scotland. And he found that the genetic engineering process itself not the individual unique organisms. So when you say we should look at each organism that genetically modified he found that the process itself of trans Genesis seemed to.

He found he did his research on mammals and that it showed evidence of organ damage thickening of the small intestine and poor brain development. It was not from the actual lectern that was put into the gene but it was from the process itself. He went on the show in Britain called The World in Action. There was so much pure publicly because of what you know the information that he was fired the next day his director said that the research did not exist and seize the data and halted six other projects only to find out that Monsanto had given that institute a grant of two hundred twenty four thousand dollars in the weeks before. Later on his information came out in Lancet the British Medical Journal. And because the information showed up in an in an internal audit and it showed that yes these indeed were you know these this research had happened since then. The FBI in our country has been allowing these kind of genetically modified things without prior. Safety Testing like they've not done with other

things. So they're favoring the food manufacturer at the expense of us the consumer. And there has been no independent well or federally sponsored research on genetically engineered food in the United States but the United Kingdom Fen-Phen. So the fact that you're saying that people aren't concerned it's not logic people's response it's just emotional. Just because your logic is the only thing that's available to us as a consumer doesn't mean that your logic presides and that our response is an emotional one. I really need to get a response from the guest because we're getting really short on that out because I think I could see he probably gets funding from Monsanto or other corporations. And so it behooves him to put out this information and his you know and his plans when we are not being given the information because of no research. And it's an essential censoring of our press by corporations.

Well let me let me pick up on that first of all I take no funding from any corporations I don't have any research grants and I'm beholding to no one. And in fact my purpose here is to do a critical and independent and as objective analysis as I can. That said all of us come to the table with beliefs prejudices and preferences. And I would probably view the world very different. Scuse me the research on genetically engineered things that is not being done in here. Well if you could give me a chance to answer that how are you. I don't know. I don't know how to say this I mean it in the most polite as way you and I have an enormous difference of opinion in interpret ing items of fact. And I think there are a number of things that you said that have no doubt that you believe your sources where you get them from. And it's a good opportunity for us at the Academy to do what we do best which is look for corroborative evidence do critical thinking qualify authorities and you know all the rest of it I think and look for you know what peer

reviewed evidence there is. I would point out that puts thise paper that you mention was not only not peer reviewed it was rejected by all the reviewers who looked at it who said that it should not be published when there was a Royal Society hearing on what the paper was about. They concluded and he agreed that no meaningful scientific conclusion could be drawn from his studies. Now why let me Scuse me why one would seize that particular study when they were little literally dozens of other published animal studies that show no effects in animals. To me suggests that you are looking for the study that proves your point of view and want to ignore the 20 some odd other animal studies and I refer you to a review done recently by Professor Jimmy Clark in animal sciences which is available on the net where he where he carefully reviews those peer reviewed scientific studies and of the effect on animals of eating GM foods. Now now. Excuse me I have a

right to respond Yeah we do. I would appreciate it if because we didn't interrupt you when you were making your point someone wanted to let the guests have the sound. It is in fact not the case that these things are allowed on the market without prior safety testing without either government or university testing there are literally hundreds of studies out there it's not all done by the companies and on the other hand I agreed with the earlier talker and I don't agree with you that it would be nice if we had more capacity to do independent studies one of the reason is that I took the position I'm in is to try to catalyze more of that kind of study here and to see if we couldn't develop expertise in this area because I personally am more confortable with our answers to questions. The most important point that you made and I want to sort of close with this is that information is being withheld from us and that the press is censoring it. I absolutely reject that. I suggest you read PROFESSOR EARL Abbot at Iowa State University studies of what the press is doing with biotech

information. Basically extremely biased against the biotech industry and extremely biased against biotechnology over 90 percent of the stories that appear on television radio and in the print media about biotech are negative and relatively unbalanced. And they did this by. Looking at literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of reporting events I think the information's out there the challenge is to sort out what's good information and what's bad information. I would describe for example what happened to pot site who violated a no publication order of his institute very very differently than you do. And what we need to do is chase down the facts of the situation. They're there. There's no censorship here. Well I've been in Europe before and I realized that they do have access to more information than we are getting here. And I have you know there are other sources of information that you can read that are not being allowed in the mainstream press is what I'm

speaking about and the research I do not trust a research or a company being their own watchdog. Let me pick up on that I think you're right on that. I wouldn't trust a company being their own watchdog either. The federal government regulators and the scientific advisory panels that work for them and I've been on the FDA FDA s food advisory panel so I know how this works and I've seen it in action. Their job is to review the company's data and hold their feet to the flyer to qualify that data and to make sure that it's it's good and that nothing's being withheld or distorted by the company. There are checks and balances in that process. But if we had as you suggested just trust the company would be you know completely on your side about that I would like that kind of system either. Want to jump in here I hope the caller forgive me but we just have about seven eight minutes and I have several other callers like to give a one or two other people a chance and also mention real quick Our guest is Bruce chassis from here from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign He's associate executive director of the

campus biotechnology center. He's also professor of food microbiology and we're talking about some of the issues raised around biotech crops will go on here the next person in line is in southern Illinois line number four. Hello. Thank you very much for having me. If people want to become informed on this issue I drove from Chicago to where I live in Southern Illinois yesterday and read the Sierra Club July August magazine. In they have formed an engineering committee allied with Concerned citizens and scientists organic farmers religious groups and they are calling for a moratorium on the planting of a genetically engineered crop until the long term environmental and health impacts have been in and if they want to get information they can contact the WW Sierra Club org forward slash biotech and they have several articles in the year they devoted most of the issue to

the some of the pertinent facts. What bio do. Bio engineering is doing to our society. Around Monsanto has received a tripling from the EPA a tripling allowance for round up ready release on their crops and it has already been linked to Hodgkin's lymphoma and cancer of the white blood cells. And I live in. An agricultural area. My neighbor has round up ready soybeans growing right now and I'm wondering when it goes into my well and my children get cancer or someone else's will these companies be held responsible. They have Article after article about how BT corn is being tested on a safety for green lace wings or other butterflies. And their possible harm to these insects How are they going to correct that and I'm emotional right now I just I cannot believe I was so wound up after reading this

magazine. And I don't think Sierra Club is just a bunch of emotional people it's scientists it's people like him the farmer in Nebraska who has been growing organically and now they drift from the organic from his farm from the biotech corn is going on over to his or growing organic farm. And I'm altering it I'd really love to have your response to these questions and then they're all excellent questions and we only have about five minutes and not nearly enough time to get into all these issues and get the Sierra Club. Well and you know we have is this is something we've talked about before on the show with different people. And I promise you this will not be the last show that we have to do on these issues and any show is wonder Will things that many many things we can take up and I expect would take up on future shows. Having said that I don't know what would you like to pick try to say a couple things about yeah let me a quick response first of all I would recommend that everybody go to the Sierra Club site too.

I would suggest that people go to all the sites and the groups that post as technology and carefully read what they have to say. Look for their peer reviewed publications. Look for their leading scientists that support that position. You know the National Academies of Sciences of most countries. The regulatory agencies of countries around the world. The science professional societies and the medical societies in most countries around the world have actually endorsed a point of view that's opposite from the Sierra Club. So I think it is important for people who are interested to go read what they're saying and then go to the U.S. government Web sites from the regulatory agencies or to go to I have t dot org which is the food technology website that I have to dot org or to get a book called Pandora's picnic basket by Ellen McKeown published by Oxford University Press in October of 2000. I'll repeat that Pandora's picnic basket. And get as much information as you can. But what I do ask you do is get a balanced point of view and read both sides of the story. Let me

end this comment by showing you the kind of thing that you can discover the the Sierra Club talking about Hodgkin's lymphoma coming from the use of Clyffe phosphate or Roundup is absolutely factually inaccurate and discredited. And there are a lot of things like that on that site in the study that they cite which was looking at was European study looking for the effects of phosphate around up. Four people died of Hodgkin's lymphoma in the control groups which were people who came from an area where the herbicide wasn't used and four people died of Hodgkin's lymphoma in the area where it was used. And they concluded because people died in the area where it was used that it causes Hodgkin's lymphoma and they continue to say that in spite of the fact that the scientific body who looked at the data said there's no meaningful difference between these. What about the issue of unintended damage to the insects that we'd like that we'd like to keep. In

along with the getting rid of the bugs we don't want people recall the monarch butterfly issue and it looks like maybe some people are looking at some other insects too. You know the question is What if we put those out there we put these these out in the environment. Could we end up killing off some insects that we would rather not. Well you know quick answer is there's no way that a biotech crop can be more damaging to insects than the use of broad spectrum pesticides. So if my comparison is pesticide versus corn I'll take the BT corn. But it is also the case that sometimes like with corn borer a farmer may not use pesticides at all. And since then you have a different risk equation you have to ask does the BT corn bother insects. There has been a very large study because of the monarch butterfly publications that came out a couple of years ago saying that it might be corn might hurt monarch butterflies. And the conclusion is that while 95 percent of all monarch butterfly larvae die before they reach adulthood from various natural cores courses

one in a hundred thousand might conceivably be killed by BT corn which is far less you know than pesticides and other unnatural things that might happen to them. There really is no risk. Does that mean we should accept these in a blanket sort of way. No we should continue to look for any environmental impacts and we should ask the companies. To provide data that they're not adversely harming the environment. OK well we're going to have to stop. I'm sorry we have some callers that we can't take but as I said to earlier caller I'm sure other programs will be talking about these issues with other guests and with other perspectives. So stay tune for the moment we want to say to our guest Bruce chassis. Thanks very much for being here. We appreciate my pleasure. Bruce Jassi is associate executive director of the campus biotechnology center here at University of Illinois and also professor of food micro biology.