Notice and Focus (2nd article)

Notice:

• In the early 1990s, Hawaii’s papaya industry was facing disaster because of the deadly papaya ring spot virus. (reason for genetic engineering)(2)

• The NewLeaf™ potato (GM food) was developed using naturally-occurring bacteria found in the soil known as Bacillus thuringiensis to protect it from the Colorado potato beetle(4)

• The USA imports 10 % of its sugar from other countries, while the remaining 90 % is extracted from domestically grown sugar beet and sugarcane.(9)

• Testing on GMOs in food and feed is routinely done using molecular techniques like DNA microarrays or qPCR (elements like p35S, tNos, pat, or bar or event-specific markers for the official GMOs like Mon810, Bt11, or GT73.)(3)

• This is the testing process of GMOs in a diagram:

• GMOs are very safe to consume(5)

• It is believed that consumption of these genetically engineered foods can cause the development of diseases that are immune to antibiotics. (1)

• not much is known about their long-term effects on human beings.(8)

• Manufacturers do not mention on the label that foods are developed by genetic manipulation because they think that this would affect their business, which is not a good practice.(7)

• Many religious and cultural communities are against such foods because they see it as an unnatural way of producing foods.(6)

Focus: 

"It is believed that consumption of these genetically engineered foods can cause the development of diseases that are immune to antibiotics." This notice is the most interesting because this makes me very curious about our foods. It questions whether our foods are safe to eat. It also makes me question if these are the very people who get food poisoning or if this is the reason why people get sick when they get older as time goes on. What if this is true to the point where the people who are affected by this can't be cured and have to suffer because of GMOs.