EU Chief Scientific Adviser's GMO lies called out in open letter

Tuesday, February 25, 2014 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Tags: GMO lies, Chief Scientific Adviser, open letter

(NaturalNews) A prominent scientist and biotechnology expert has issued a public indictment of Professor Anne Glover, the Chief Scientific Adviser to European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and a vehement supporter of genetically modified organisms (GMOs). In a recent letter, Dr. Brian John from GM-Free Cymru called out Prof. Glover for her repeated failure to acknowledge the plenteous science showing that GMOs are harmful to the environment and to humans.

Dr. John's letter, which was reprinted by GMWatch.org, chastises Prof. Glover for essentially discarding the many hundreds of published articles, both in peer-reviewed journals and other publications, showing that GMOs create resistance to chemicals and pests, pollute the environment, contaminate non-GMO and organic crops, result in horizontal gene transfer and genetic drift, and rob farmers of their solidarity, among other major impacts.

During a 2012 interview with EurActiv, for instance, Prof. Glover, who was appointed as the Commission's chief scientific advisor roughly seven months earlier, flat-out denied the existence of any evidence whatsoever showing that GMOs are in any way harmful. The former chief scientific adviser to Scotland boldly claimed that the science is somehow settled on the issue, and that the precautionary principle no longer applies with regard to GMOs.

"If we look at evidence from [more than] 15 years of growing and consuming GMO foods globally, then there is no substantiated case of any adverse impact on human health, animal health or environmental health," she purported. "I would be confident in saying that there is no more risk in eating GMO food than eating conventionally farmed food."

As nice as this might sound to the uninformed ear, these and other ridiculous statements made by Prof. Glover throughout the past several years are nothing more than blatant lies. GMO Free USA, for instance, has published citations on its "GMO SCIENCE" page for upwards of 1,200 studies, surveys and analyses on GMOs that suggest major adverse impacts associated with the "Frankencrops." And Dr. John wants to know why Prof. Glover is unequivocally ignoring such evidence.

"I wish to place on record that there is abundant and unequivocal published evidence, within and outside the peer-reviewed literature, of real harm to living organisms in the plant and animal kingdoms arising from the growing of GMO crops and the consumption of GMO foodstuffs," wrote Dr. John in his letter. "This material is freely available to any scientist who chooses to examine it, and many of the key publications are found within a list recently compiled and published by GMO Free USA."

GMO safety has never been 'substantiated,' despite hollow claims by industry zealots

Dr. John takes particular issue with Prof. Glover's cavalier use of words like "substantiated" to support her opinion that GMOs are no different than real foods, the latter of which she also absurdly claims are "toxic." Bordering on lunacy, Prof. Glover's idealistic assumptions about the alleged safety of GMOs, not to mention her irrational fixation on seeing them elevated to the status of normal food, prove that she is either lying or willfully ignorant.

"What literature do you read?" asks Dr. John. "And from whom do you obtain your scientific advice?"

He then goes on to say, "I am not impressed when somebody in your position purports to be unaware of this very large body of evidence ... The fact of the matter is that there is a powerful case showing that GMOs are harmful, with the findings of many early papers substantiated and confirmed by subsequent research. To deny that case is to perpetrate a falsehood."

You can read Dr. John's full letter to Prof. Glover here:
http://www.gmwatch.org.

You can also check out GMO Free USA's "GMO SCIENCE" page, which contains more than 1,200 citations to science refuting the safety of GMOs, here:
http://gmofreeusa.org.

Sources for this article include:

http://www.gmwatch.org

http://www.euractiv.com

http://www.euractiv.com

http://gmofreeusa.org

http://www.i-sis.org.uk

http://science.naturalnews.com