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You're Appointing Who? Please Obama, Say It's Not So!

Jeffrey Smith | 25.07.2009 10:45 | Ecology | Health | World

The person who may be responsible for more food-related illness and death
than anyone in history has just been made the US food safety czar. This is
no joke.

The person who may be responsible for more food-related illness and death
than anyone in history has just been made the US food safety czar. This is
no joke.

Here's the back story.

When FDA scientists were asked to weigh in on what was to become the most
radical and potentially dangerous change in our food supply -- the
introduction of genetically modified (GM) foods -- secret documents [1] now
reveal that the experts were very concerned. Memo after memo described
toxins, new diseases, nutritional deficiencies, and hard-to-detect
allergens. They were adamant that the technology carried "serious health
hazards," and required careful, long-term research, including human studies,
before any genetically modified organisms (GMOs) could be safely released
into the food supply.

But the biotech industry had rigged the game so that neither science nor
scientists would stand in their way. They had placed their own man in charge
of FDA policy and he wasn't going to be swayed by feeble arguments related
to food safety. No, he was going to do what corporations had done for
decades to get past these types of pesky concerns. He was going to lie.

Dangerous Food Safety Lies

When the FDA was constructing their GMO policy in 1991-2, their scientists
were clear that gene-sliced foods were significantly different and could
lead to "different risks [2] " than conventional foods. But official policy
declared [3] the opposite, claiming that the FDA knew nothing of significant
differences, and declared GMOs substantially equivalent.

This fiction became the rationale for allowing GM foods on the market
without any required safety studies whatsoever! The determination of whether
GM foods were safe to eat was placed entirely in the hands of the companies
that made them -- companies like Monsanto, which told us that the PCBs, DDT,
and Agent Orange were safe.

GMOs were rushed onto our plates in 1996. Over the next nine years, multiple
chronic illnesses [4] in the US nearly doubled -- from 7% to 13%.
Allergy-related emergency room visits doubled [5] between 1997 and 2002
while food allergies, especially among children, skyrocketed. We also
witnessed a dramatic rise in asthma, autism, obesity, diabetes, digestive
disorders, and certain cancers.

In January of this year, Dr. P. M. Bhargava, one of the world's top
biologists, told me that after reviewing 600 scientific journals, he
concluded that the GM foods in the US are largely responsible for the
increase in many serious diseases.

In May, the American Academy of Environmental Medicine [6] concluded that
animal studies have demonstrated a causal relationship [7] between GM foods
and infertility, accelerated aging, dysfunctional insulin regulation,
changes in major organs and the gastrointestinal system, and immune problems
such as asthma, allergies, and inflammation

In July, a report [8] by eight international experts determined that the
flimsy and superficial evaluations of GMOs by both regulators and GM
companies "systematically overlook the side effects [9] " and significantly
underestimate "the initial signs of diseases like cancer and diseases of the
hormonal, immune, nervous and reproductive systems, among others."

The Fox Guarding the Chickens

If GMOs are indeed responsible for massive sickness and death, then the
individual who oversaw the FDA policy that facilitated their introduction
holds a uniquely infamous role in human history. That person is Michael
Taylor. He had been Monsanto's attorney before becoming policy chief at the
FDA. Soon after, he became Monsanto's vice president and chief lobbyist.

This month Michael Taylor became the senior advisor to the commissioner of
the FDA. He is now America's food safety czar. What have we done?

The Milk Man Cometh

While Taylor was at the FDA in the early 90's, he also oversaw the policy
regarding Monsanto's genetically engineered bovine growth hormone [10]
(rbGH/rbST) -- injected into cows to increase milk supply.

The milk from injected cows has more pus, more antibiotics, more bovine
growth hormone, and most importantly, more insulin-like growth factor 1
(IGF-1). IGF-1 is a huge risk factor for common cancers and its high levels
in this drugged milk is why so many medical organizations [11] and hospitals
[12] have taken stands against rbGH. A former Monsanto scientist told me
that when three of his Monsanto colleagues evaluated rbGH safety and
discovered the elevated IGF-1 levels, even they refused to drink any more
milk -- unless it was organic and therefore untreated.

Government scientists from Canada evaluated the FDA's approval [13] of rbGH
and concluded that it was a dangerous facade. The drug was banned in Canada,
as well as Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. But it was approved in
the US while Michael Taylor was in charge. His drugged milk might have
caused a significant rise in US cancer rates. Additional published evidence
[14] also implicates rbGH in the high rate of fraternal twins in the US.

Taylor also determined that milk from injected cows did not require any
special labeling. And as a gift to his future employer Monsanto, he wrote a
white paper suggesting that if companies ever had the audacity to label
their products as not using rbGH, they should also include a disclaimer
stating that according to the FDA, there is no difference between milk from
treated and untreated cows.

Taylor's disclaimer was also a lie. Monsanto's own studies and FDA
scientists officially acknowledged differences in the drugged milk. No
matter. Monsanto used Taylor's white paper as the basis to successfully sue
dairies that labeled their products as rbGH-free.

Will Monsanto's Wolff Also Guard the Chickens?

As consumers learned that rbGH was dangerous, they refused to buy the milk.
To keep their customers, a tidal wave of companies has publicly committed to
not use the drug and to label their products as such. Monsanto tried
unsuccessfully to convince the FDA and FTC to make it illegal for dairies to
make rbGH-free claims, so they went to their special friend in Pennsylvania
-- Dennis Wolff. As state secretary of agriculture, Wolff unilaterally
declared that labeling products rbGH-free was illegal, and that all such
labels must be removed from shelves statewide. This would, of course,
eliminate the label from all national brands, as they couldn't afford to
create separate packaging for just one state.

Fortunately, consumer demand forced Pennsylvania's Governor Ed Rendell to
step in and stop Wolff's madness. But Rendell allowed Wolff to take a
compromised position that now requires rbGH-free claims to also be
accompanied by Taylor's FDA disclaimer on the package.

President Obama is considering Dennis Wolff for the top food safety post at
the USDA. Yikes!

Rumor [15] has it that the reason why Pennsylvania's governor is supporting
Wolff's appointment is to get him out of the state -- after he "screwed up
so badly" with the rbGH decision. Oh great, governor. Thanks.

Ohio Governor Gets Taylor-itus

Ohio not only followed Pennsylvania's lead by requiring Taylor's FDA
disclaimer on packaging, they went a step further. They declared that
dairies must place that disclaimer on the same panel where rbGH-free claims
are made, and even dictated the font size. This would force national brands
to re-design their labels and may ultimately dissuade them from making
rbGH-free claims at all. The Organic Trade Association and the International
Dairy Foods Association filed a lawsuit against Ohio. Although they lost the
first court battle, upon appeal, the judge ordered a mediation session that
takes place today. Thousands of Ohio citizens have flooded Governor
Strickland's office with urgent requests to withdraw the states
anti-consumer labeling requirements.

Perhaps the governor has an ulterior motive for pushing his new rules. If he
goes ahead with his labeling plans, he might end up with a top appointment
in the Obama administration.

To hear what America is saying about GMOs and to add your voice, go to our
new non-GMO Facebook Group [16] .

Jeffrey M. Smith is the author of Seeds of Deception: Exposing Industry and
Government Lies About the Safety of the Genetically Engineered Foods You're
Eating [17] and Genetic Roulette: The Documented Health Risks of Genetically
Engineered Foods [18] from Chelsea Green Publishing [19] . Smith worked at a
GMO detection laboratory, founded the Institute for Responsible Technology,
and currently lives in Iowa--surrounded by genetically modified corn and
soybeans. For more information, visit Chelsea Green [19] .

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References:
[1]