Sick patients used as human guinea pigs in GM foods experiment

Tuesday, April 03, 2007 by: Christian Evans
Tags: GM foods, health news, Natural News

Patients have been fed genetically modified (GM) Russet Burbank potatoes in an experiment to determine their nutritional effects on the human body. Developed by Monsanto, a multinational biotech company, the potatoes, modified to resist Colorado beetles, were dispensed to Russian heart and blood pressure patients as part of a recent study.

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What you need to know - Conventional View

• This experiment is detailed in an unpublished report by the Nutrition Institute of the Russian Academy of Medical Science.

• The report describes the patients as "volunteers" and states that they are "suffering from hypertensive disease and ischemic heart disease."

• According to the research, rats that ate similar potatoes suffered reductions in the weight of their hearts and prostate glands, but all changes were "within permissible physiological fluctuation."

• These same rats suffered "increases of kidneys' absolute weight" when compared to ones fed conventional potatoes.

• Some scientists believe that the trials were too short, and performed on too few humans, to produce meaningful results of long-term effects.

• "A certain risk of GM food products for human health does exist, as there can be by-effects of inserted genes besides the designed ones," according to the report.

• The report concludes: "The genetically modified potato provided by Monsanto did not reveal toxic, mutagenic, immune modulating and allergic effects within the examined parameters of the present experiment".

• Last year alone, over 10 million farmers grew 250 million acres of GM crops in 22 countries - home to over half the world’s population, according to The Guardian

What you need to know - Alternative View

Statements and opinions by Mike Adams, author for Truth Publishing

• To use sick patients as human guinea pigs in a GM foods experiment grossly oversteps the ethical and moral boundaries of medical science.

• Various GM foods have already been shown to have destructive health effects on internal organs and reproductive capabilities. Subjecting sick and diseased humans to these unnatural foods in "volunteer" clinical trials is a violation of medical ethics standards.

Bottom line

• Heart patients were used in an experiment to study the effects of GM foods on humans.