Effects of GMOs

Through this GMO epoch, we have devised more and more toxic combinations of chemical warfare to kill the weeds and pests from the comfort of the driver cabs of giant farm equipment. The result is two generations of commodity crop farmers that rarely set foot on the thousands of acres they spray chemicals into. For those that remain in more manual food crop production, the GMO-enabled chemical food production process has become so toxic that constant turnover of labor via migrant farmers and the use of undocumented foreign labor has been necessary. These tactics distance farm owners and state regulators from any responsibility for the health consequences of medium and long term exposure to the application and harvesting of these chemical inputs. According to the Agriculture Department, nearly half of crop hands in the US are undocumented immigrants. The New York Times reports growers and labor contractors estimate it is closer to 75 percent.

Every time we spray Roundup, 2,4-D or the newest GMO Bayer product, Liberty Link, we forever alter the soil and the genome of the microbiome of weeds and nearby plants, as well as the animal and human food consumers. In parallel to the genetic consequences of widespread use of GMOs across the planet, we create global deprivation of nutrients at all levels of biology on earth. Glyphosate, the active ingredient in RoundUp, and the most ubiquitous herbicide and antibiotic on the planet also functions as a potent chelation agent, locking up the nutrients within soil, plant, and water systems such that we can now find ourselves in the equivalent biologic state of starvation in the midst of the most extreme caloric excess that humanity has ever produced. We have spent centuries, if not millennia, assuming that we are the ordained masters of nature, free to exploit, manipulate, and with domineering force, extract her resources for our own comfort and wealth. With the advent of the GMO epoch, we have accelerated our capacity to manipulate nature at a rate unimaginable in any other time. Today, we are seeing the consequences of our meddling.

In human history, we have never seen an explosion of chronic disease equivalent to today’s health crisis.

This nearly simultaneous epidemic of chronic disease began in the mid 1990s as a direct result from a globally occurring environmental shift. Chemical farming and oversaturation of GMOs are the culprits, where they have altered our environment to the point of decimation to our immune systems.

Autism spectrum disorder has risen from 1 in 5,000 children in 1975, to 1 in 36 in 2016, and we are on target to experience 1 in 3 children with Autism by 2035.

This nearly simultaneous epidemic of chronic disease began in the mid 1990s as a direct result from a globally occurring environmental shift. Chemical farming and oversaturation of GMOs are the culprits, where they have altered our environment to the point of decimation to our immune systems.

The GMO Debate

The most widely used commercial pesticide today is an herbicide called Roundup. It’s active ingredient, glyphosate, inhibits soil, plants, bacteria, and fungi from producing several essential amino acids by blocking the shikimate pathway. Glyphosate also deletes the production of alkaloids from plants, which are the natural medicinal features in our food.

The chemical industry claims that since humans lack this enzymatic pathway, there is no target for glyphosate in our species — however a healthy human body wholly depends on these essential amino acids to thrive, since we cannot produce them ourselves. Further, by ingesting glyphosate, we see direct injury to the protein structure that holds our gut lining together. Every time we breathe, eat, and drink this toxic chemical, our gut leaks, and our immune system gets overwhelmed.

Today, glyphosate is made by nearly every chemical company in the world. We use 4.5 billion pounds globally, yet statistics show that less than 0.1% of Roundup actually hits a weed.

In other words: We essentially started drinking Roundup in the 1990s. Within the US, the Mississippi River alone collects more than 80% of the entire country’s Roundup. It’s no surprise that the last 90 miles of the river are called Cancer Alley, seeing the highest rates of cancer in the entire developed world.

The prevalence of cancer and glyphosate are inextricably linked. Recent cancer research shows evidence of naturally-occuring bacteria and fungi in the soil that produce a similar looking chemical as chemotherapy. Additionally, we can now predict the appearance of any type of cancer by the absence of specific bacteria in the gut. Meaning, bacteria and fungi in our gut, sourced from nutrient-rich plants and soil, can serve as our best natural medicine.

Dangers of Genetic Engineering

Instead, we continue to consume a chemical that causes us to lose our self identity between the outside world and our immune system. Couple this with our over-reliance on packaged and processed foods, created with chemically-altered compounds and sugars — our physiology as mammals simply cannot handle it. The result is an epidemic of autoimmune and other chronic diseases at the micro level, timed in synchronicity beginning in 1996. On the macro level, not only do we see a loss of our self identity as human beings, but our crops, produce, and livestock suffer as well.

For instance, genetically modified corn that grows across a ten thousand-acre chemical farm hardly has any consciousness, nutrients, or medicines. Our livestock then consume that corn, resulting in weak and sickened cows, which we then eat. The plants that the animals ate were stressed, the animals themselves were on the verge of death, and then we put that in our mouth in the form of a hamburger. It’s no wonder why an hour later, we experience bloating, indigestion, or even a panic attack. A stressed food chain means a stressed consumer.

We are coming to see how destructive the introduction of Roundup into our environment has been, but rather than come to an acceptance of the danger, we have instead engineered plant genomic modifications which are designed to make plants less susceptible to the toxic effects of herbicides. The horror of all this is that these genetically modified plants are designed to be used in conjunction with and often enhance the actions of cancer-causing agents such as glyphosate.

One example of this genomic modification is LibertyLink. LibertyLink encompasses a group of genes isolated from two species of Streptomyces bacteria. When the genes are inserted into a variety of plants such as corn, soybeans, cotton, canola, it renders them resistant to various herbicides. Resistance is achieved by preventing herbicides from binding to and inhibiting the enzyme glutamine synthetase. Glutamine synthetase is an important enzyme that allows plants to make amino acids vital to the human diet. When the enzyme is inhibited by herbicides, the plant cannot produce these important amino acids, depriving us of necessary dietary nutrients.

The LibertyLink genome may prevent herbicides from inhibiting glutamine synthetase leaving nutrients intact, but it also allows the toxic herbicides not binding to the enzyme to accumulate within the plant. These herbicides are later ingested in our diets.

The desire to increase crop yields isn’t limited to genomic modification of plants, but also genetic engineering of the very soil in which they grow. This is because increased crop production has led to the over cultivation of land, which has depleted the soil of nutrients needed for healthy plant life. The nutrient depletion in soil has done great damage to the vital symbiotic relationship between the microbiome and plant life.

Impacts to Soil, Plants, and People

Recently, these efforts nearly led to disaster. In the 1990’s, there was an effort to release a genetically engineered soil bacteria named Klebsiella planticola into the environment. What was thought to be a bacteria, which would enhance the growth of crops, turned out to be a monster that would have killed all plant life on Earth. A reported lack of oversight and poorly controlled scientific studies almost causes an ecological disaster from which there would be no recovery.

With the illusion of successfully circumventing the impending food security crisis on our planet by artificially altering the genes of crops and soil, science has moved on to investigating ways we can genetically modify animal food sources. While these approaches to increased food production are still under investigation, they are nearing a point where they will be introduced into the environment, and it is at this juncture we have an opportunity to prevent potential disaster.

One of the most developed genetically modified animal food sources is salmon. A laboratory in Canada has developed salmon with increased activity of growth hormone, allowing the fish to grow much larger— and at twice the rate— than what is seen in nature. Currently, these salmon are living in farms in Indiana and are ready to be introduced into our food chain. The FDA gave approval for the distribution of these salmon as a food source, despite numerous groups raising concern about the effects on natural salmon populations, should the genetically altered fish escape into the wild. At the center of the discussion is the USDA’s National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Standard (NBFDS), which some claim is ambiguous and contains numerous exemptions. The status of when we will see these fish introduced into our food chain is uncertain. The FDA has assured the public that these fish are sterile females and would not be able to breed if introduced into the wild. But, they’ve said nothing about the genetic knock-off effects in that species or those consuming this GMO meat in our food.

Thinking about all of the ways we’ve disrupted plant and animal life should give us pause when we consider modifications of the human genome. Most pressing in our world today is the use of DNA and RNA vaccines. We already know that federal regulations are ambiguous and lack transparency, but what happens to those regulations when genetically modified products are fast tracked? As we stand on the precipice of another great extinction, we should consider all of the ways in which we have forced our will on to nature and remember: nature will react. It’s best to remember, as the saying goes, “the road to Hell is paved with good intentions” and reflect on how we have negatively affected our health.

With a majority of the population struggling with obesity, weight issues, and collapsing metabolism, we often feel at war against our food. We’ve created this same battle mindset in our own farming practices, believing we have to kill all the bacteria, fungi, and pests, when in fact, what we’re really doing is creating monoculture and wiping out biodiversity.