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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0480.050 2010-2012 Page 1 of 1 Murashige, Laura r bu P1 COMM. From: JACK WEBER [jackadamweber @gmail.com] Sent: Monday, December 05, 2011 11:25 PM To: counciltestimony @ co.hawaii.hi.us Cc: cohmayor @co.hawaii.hi.us; dyagong @co.hawaii.hi.us; dikeda @co.hawaii.hi.us; jyoshimoto @co.hawaii.hi.us; donishi @co.hawaii.hi.us; fblas @co.hawaii.hi.us; bsmart @co.hawaii.hi.us; bford @co.hawaii.hi.us; apilago @co.hawaii.hi.us; phoffman @co.hawaii.hi.us; vchung @honolulu.gov; tberg @honolulu.gov; emartin @honolulu.gov; ianderson @honolulu.gov; ccldistrict4 @honolulu.gov; akobayashi @honolulu.gov; tgabbard @honolulu.gov; rcachola @honolulu.gov; bharimoto @honolulu.gov; ngarcia @honolulu.gov Subject: Jack A. Weber testimony for mandatory GMO labeling in Hawai'i Attachments: Hawaii GMO labeling testimony.docx Please find attached (and printed below) my testimony in favor of mandatory labeling for GMO foods in Hawaii. Please review my extensively researched documentations for the hazards liabilities, and labeling justifications for GMO foods Thank you for your consideration. 2c Sincerely, Jack Adam Weber cp -- cr -< Jack Adam Weber,L.Ac., Dipl. A.C., C.H. M n PO Box 2130 -'-r- Pahoa, HI 96778 vww.PocticHcal.ing.com 03 -- Comm. No 8"""5"-_ Ref. To: Ref. Date £EC 0 7 201) 12/6/2011 Submitted by: Jack Adam Weber, L.Ac., Dipl,A.C., C.H. P.O. Box 2130 Pahoa HI 96778 jackadamweber@gmail.com Re: Mandatory Labeling of GMO foods in Hawaii To whom it Concerns, December 5, 2011 I submit this testimonial as an author and primary health care physician (Hawaii) in opposition to GMO foods. If GMO foods are to be on our shelves, at the very least, I want mandatory labeling of any foods with GMO ingredients.As a first order of concern regarding GMO foods, it is noteworthy that none of the GMO crops currently planted have been adequately tested for their long-tern health effects on mammals, let alone on humans. The emerging body of evidence on the short-term health effects is alarming. In this letter I outline these many health dangers of GMO foods. To begin,the following information was collected by author and GMO researcher,Jeffrey Smith. The footnotes refer to page numbers in his book,Seeds of Deception. "The biotech industry claims that the FDA has thoroughly evaluated GM foods and found them safe. This is untrue. Internal FDA documents made public from a lawsuit, reveal that agency scientists warned that GM foods might create toxins, allergies, nutritional problems, and new diseases that might be difficult to identify.131-140 Although they urged their superiors to require long-term tests on each GM variety prior to approval,the political appointees at the agency, including a former attorney for Monsanto, ignored the scientists. Official policy claims that the foods are no different130 and do NOT require safety testing.A manufacturer can introduce a GM food without even informing the government or consumers.146 A January 2001 report from an expert panel of the Royal Society of Canada said it was "scientifically unjustifiable"136 to presume that GM foods are safe. Likewise, a 2002 report by the UK's Royal Society said that genetic modification "could lead to unpredicted harmful changes in the nutritional state of foods," and recommended that potential health effects of GM foods be rigorously researched before being fed to pregnant or breast-feeding women, elderly people, those suffering from chronic disease, and babies.263 How could the government approve dangerous foods?A close examination reveals that industry manipulation and political collusion-not sound science-was the driving force. • Government employees who complained were harassed, stripped of responsibilities, or fired.77-83 • Scientists were threatened. Evidence was stolen. Data was omitted or distorted. Some regulators even claimed they were offered bribes to approve a GM product." Next, most of the countries in the European Union (EU) and countries around the world have mandatory labeling laws for GMO foods, despite having had GMO foods essentially forced into them by pressure from the office of then president George W. Bush. President Bush's office warned the EU that"some harm"would be done to the EU if they refused GMO foods. Despite this. Currently over 30 countries ban or propose to ban GMO foods. There is a reason for these widespread bans. Of primary concern is that no long- term studies have been made on the health effects of GMO foods. In fact, GMO crops were insubstantially and essentially illegally approved for implementation in the American food supply because initial safety tests were not performed with the actual GM proteins in GM crops but on approximations to those proteins.This sad reality was posted by the Institute of Science in Society: "...the evaluations of mammalian safety and environmental impacts (particularly the impact on non-target organisms) have been done using a bacterial surrogate for the proteins produced in GM crops. Consequently, GM crops produced in the United States, Canada and other countries are untested and unknown for toxicities, and the failure to label the GM foods produced from the GM crops has obscured any impact on humans and animals.Apparently,this makes the approval of the GM crops illegal." Contrary to what the biotech companies purported as a means to end world hunger, in reality the majority of GMO crops are not going towards feeding people, but rather to feeding animals for meat production.Additionally, Contrary to industry contention, GMOs have increased pesticide use and produced significantly lower yields than natural varieties. GMO crops have increased the use of herbicides and pesticides. The very purpose of RoundUp Ready GMO crops is to withstand large amounts of herbicide spraying, and each year farmers are now having to use more and more pounds of herbicide to combat resistant weeds, called superweeds. Super-bugs resistant to the Bt- toxin, another form of GMO modification that causes plants to produce endogenous pesticides as modifications of that produced by the soil bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis, are also on the rise. In several Midwest states whole crops of corn are being decimated by the Western rootworm beetle, Diabrotica virgifera virgifera, which has developed resistance to the Bt protein, Cry3Bbl. Scientific evidence is mounting for the severe adverse health effects of GMO foods. In one study, the RoundUp Ready gene from GMO foods was found to have transferred to the intestinal bacterial flora of the people tested, and were still active. This means that strange RoundUp Ready proteins, those that confer resistance to the same herbicide, are being produced in our intestines by the beneficial bacteria in our guts. Yuck. What may be even scarier is that no tests have been performed to see if the Bt- toxin(which is the GM insecticide from Bacillus thuringiensis in concentrated and modified form from that naturally occurring) can be transferred to the symbiotic bacteria in our digestive tracts. If it is transferred this means that these bacteria would be continually secreting this pesticide in our intestines. In another incident, Bt-toxin was also found in the bloodstream of fetuses and in pregnant and non-pregnant women. Upon taking blood samples,researchers detected the Bt CrylAb toxin (one form of the Bt-toxin) in a shocking 93 percent of maternal and 80 percent of fetal blood samples.And 69 percent of non-pregnant women tested positive for the toxin in their blood. Here is more verifiable and documented information on the effects of GMO compiled by The Institute for Responsible Technology: There are only about two dozen published, peer-reviewed animal feeding studies on the health effects of GM foods. • One study showed evidence of damage to the immune system and vital organs, and a potentially pre-cancerous condition.When the scientist tried to alert the public about these alarming discoveries, he lost his job and was silenced with threats of a lawsuit. • Two other studies also showed evidence of a potentially pre-cancerous condition. The other seven studies,which were superficial in their design,were not designed to identify these details. • In an unpublished study,laboratory rats fed a GM crop developed stomach lesions and seven of the forty died within two weeks. The crop was approved without further tests. Many industry studies appear to be rigged to find no problems. In the case of a genetically engineered bovine growth hormone (rbGH), for example, researchers injected cows with only one forty-seventh the normal dosage before reporting hormone residues in milk. They heated the milk 120 times longer than standard,to report that pasteurization destroys the hormone.They added cows to their study that were pregnant before treatment, to claim that rbGH didn't impede fertility. Cows that fell sick were dropped from studies altogether. With soybeans, serious nutritional differences between GM and natural soy were omitted from a published paper. Feeding studies masked any problems by using mature animals instead of developing ones and by diluting their GM soy 10 to 1 with non-GM protein. There are no adequate tests to verify that GM food will not create dangerous allergic reactions.While an international organization developed testing standards to minimize the possibility of allowing allergenic GM varieties on the market, GM corn currently sold in the U.S. has not been subjected to those tests and would most certainly fail them. One of these tests, for example,uses a test tube simulation to evaluate how long a potential GM allergen can last inside the digestive system before being broken down. Compared to the recommended international standards, however, one biotech company used a far stronger acid concentration and more than 1,250 times the recommended amount of a digestive enzyme to make the claim that their protein degrades too quickly to cause a reaction. The only human feeding trial ever conducted confirmed that genetically engineered genes from soy transferred to the bacteria inside the digestive tract. (The biotech industry had previously said that such a transfer was impossible.) The World Health Organization, the British and American Medical Associations, and several other groups have expressed concern that if the "antibiotic resistant marker genes" used in GM foods got transferred to bacteria, it could create super-diseases that are immune to antibiotics.59-60 More worrisome is that the "promoter" used inside GM foods could get transferred to bacteria or internal organs. Promoters act like a light switches, permanently turning on genes that might otherwise be switched off. Scientists believe that this might create unpredictable health effects, including the potentially pre-cancerous cell growth found in the animal feeding studies mentioned above. The biotech industry says that millions have been eating GM foods without ill effect. This is misleading. • About 100 people died and 5-10,000 to fell seriously ill when they consumed the food supplement L-tryptophan. Only those who consumed the variety that was genetically modified became ill.That brand had minute,but deadly contaminants that would easily pass through current regulations today. If the disease it created had not been rare and acute,with crippling and deadly symptoms, the GM supplement might never have been traced as the cause. Once discovered,however, industry and government covered up facts and diverted the blame. Even the FDA testimony before Congress withheld vital information. For a summary of the L-tryptophan issue,click here. For an in-depth presentation of the issue, see Toxic L-tryptophan: Shedding Light on a Mysterious Epidemic, by William E. Crist. • Milk from rbGH-treated cows contains an increased amount of the hormone IGF-1, which is one of the highest risk factors associated with breast and prostate cancer, among others. • Soy allergies skyrocketed by 50% in the UK, coinciding with the introduction of GM soy imports from the U.S. According to a March 2001 report,the Center for Disease Control says that food is responsible for twice the number of illnesses in the U.S. compared to estimates just seven years earlier. This increase roughly corresponds to the period when Americans have been eating GM food. Could that be contributing to the 5,000 deaths, 325,000 hospitalizations, and 76 million illnesses related to food each year? Might it play in role in our national epidemic of obesity or the rise in diabetes or lymphatic cancers?We have no way of knowing if there is a connection because no one has looked for one. One of the most dangerous aspects of genetic engineering is the closed thinking and consistent effort to silence those with contrary evidence or concerns. Just before stepping down from office, former Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman admitted the following: "What I saw generically on the pro-biotech side was the attitude that the technology was good, and that it was almost immoral to say that it wasn't good, because it was going to solve the problems of the human race and feed the hungry and clothe the naked...And there was a lot of money that had been invested in this, and if you're against it,you're Luddites,you're stupid.That, frankly,was the side our government was on...You felt like you were almost an alien, disloyal, by trying to present an open-minded view" Contrast this with the warning by the editors of Nature Biotechnology: "The risks in biotechnology are undeniable,and they stem from the unknowable in science and commerce. It is prudent to recognize and address those risks, not compound them by overly optimistic or foolhardy behavior." The biotech industry and the government have been foolhardy indeed. Blinded, perhaps by the baseless myth that GM foods are needed to feed the world, they gamble with our health and support their safety claims on obsolete or unproven assumptions.Accepting their vacuous assurances by eating these dangerous foods or serving them to your customers may likewise be overly optimistic or foolhardy." In summary, here is a concise list of the primary dangers and problems with GMO foods: 1) GM foods have not been adequately tested for safety, both for preliminary safety and long-term safety 2) FDA cautions for the safety of GMO foods was ignored by political appointees when GMO foods were approved 3) GMO foods such as corn, soybean, cottonseed, and canola have genes from non-plant species forced into them which do not occur in nature. This is dangerous tampering with natural order. 4) Genetic engineering creates extensive mutations in hundreds of thousands of sites in plant's DNA which can lead to aberrant protein production leading to allergies and other auto-immune disorders. 5) Studies document that more herbicides and pesticides are used on GMO crops,which places dangerous poisons into our environment and food supply. 6) GM soy has been shown to cause allergies in greater frequency than natural soy, as cooked GM soy has 7 times the amount of a known soy allergen. 7) GM crops of soy, corn, and papaya contain proteins of known allergens. Bt-toxin corn and cotton cause allergic reactions in farm workers, as it is thousands of times more concentrated than natural bacteria version. 8) GMOs can make you allergic to non-GMO foods by impairing digestive function, as tests on rats has demonstrated. 9) GMOs proved to injure the livers of rats fed GMO canola, potatoes, and soy. 10) GMOs have been shown to cause sterility, infant mortality, and maligned reproductive organs in rats. 11) Thousands of sheep, buffalo,and goats in India died after grazing on Bt cotton plants after harvest. Others suffered poor health and reproductive problems. 12) Farmers in Europe and Asia say that cows,water buffaloes, chickens, and horses died from eating Bt corn varieties. 13) About two dozen US farmers report that Bt corn varieties caused widespread sterility in pigs or cows. 14) The stomach lining of rats fed GM potatoes showed excessive cell growth, a condition that may lead to cancer. Rats also had damaged organs and immune systems. 15) If GM foods on the market are causing common diseases or if their effects appear only after long-term exposure,we may not be able to identify the source of the problem for decades, if at all. There is no monitoring of GMO-related illnesses and no long-term animal studies. Heavily invested biotech corporations are gambling with the health of our nation for their profit. 16) When the tipping point of consumer concern about GMOs was achieved in Europe in 1999,within a single week virtually all major food manufacturers committed to remove GM ingredients. 17) GMO foods were supposedly created to solve world hunger, but in fact statistics show that yields are often no better and even worse than non- GMO crops. 18) With the relatively recent development of resistant weeds and bugs to RoundUp and engineered Bt-toxin,the promise of GMO crops to benefit starvation are actually creating blight and the scary reality of super- weeds and super-bugs, much the same way that antibiotic-resistant super-bacteria are inadvertently bred even though antibiotic drugs are becoming more and more concentrated and powerful. 19) Bt toxins and Bt crops contain a fundamental flaw in their regulatory assessment—their toxicity testing is not based on the toxins in Bt crops themselves, but on surrogate toxins.This means that no tests have been performed on the actual Bt-toxins produced by the Bt-toxin GM plants. 20) GMO foods were introduced into the food supply not only with inadequate testing but under corrupt pretense by biotech colluding with biased and government officials and policy makers with vested financial interests in overlooking due diligence for the safety of GMO foods. The transnational companies that brought us Agent Orange, DDT, saccharin (i.e., Nutrasweet),Aspartame, PCBs, and dioxins are now foisting GMOs onto the world.We all know the toxic legacy of these substances; their track record speaks volumes. How can we trust the safety of GMO foods given the history of poisonings from the creations of these companies, namely Monsanto?We cannot, especially in light of the voluminous and ever-growing body of scientific evidence both proving and suggesting the severe and long-lasting. In five or ten years it is likely that we will look back on this era of genetically engineered foods with the same regret, shame and rue as we do with what we know now about the previous lethal creations cited just above. In my well-researched opinion, GMO foods are nothing less than a virulent cancer spreading across the globe If GMO foods cannot be altogether banned for all the reasons mentioned in this letter, it is imperative that at the very least GMO foods be labeled so that consumers can do what we can to safeguard our health in the face of what in a few years will in all likelihood be determined to be one the greatest errors of human invention. I only hope that the destruction of our soils and pollution of our waterways from herbicides and pesticides (also produced by the companies who gift us GMO products) is not beyond the point of repair. I hope that the toxins from GMO foods have not permanently entered the lifecycle of humanity beyond the point of no-return. evidence suggests that these possibilities are increasingly possible, if not probable. I urge you then to support mandatory labeling of GMO foods, if only to begin to turn back the perilous course of inappropriate technology and to save our world from greed, manipulation, and the highly suspect generation of GMO foods. Thank you for your time and consideration. Sincerely, Jack Adam Weber REFERENCES: http://wakeup-world.com/2011/10/18/our-real-healthcare-crisis-the-devastating-domino- effect-of-gmo-"foods-and-what-you-can-do-about-it/ http://www.i-sis.org.uk/GMcropsIncreasedHerbicide.php http://www.i-sis.org.uk/BTTIGMC.php http://www.responsibletechnology.org/health-risks http://www.responsibletechnology.org/gmo-dangers http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/31/beetle-monsantos-genetically- modified-corn n 944138.html https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=gmail&attid=0.1&thid=1340ede2f21b92 77&mt=application/pdf&url=https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui%3D2%26ik%3Db2 cl0abcbd%26view%3Datt%26th%3D1340ede2f21b9277%26attid%3D0.1%26dis p%3Dsafe%26zw&sig=AHIEtbT1cFAHVBDHKnqu7HegNgbi2zARZA http://www.seedsofdeception.com/Public/AboutGeneticallyModifiedFoods/Danger sofGeneticallyEngineeredFoods/index.cfm http://www.naturalnews.com/032407 Bt insecticide GMOs.html http://www.seedsofdeception.com/Public/AboutGeneticallyModifiedFoods/Danger sofGeneticallyEngineered Foods/index.cfm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto http://www.i-sis.org.uk/BTTIGMC.php http://voiceoftheenvironment.org/gmos/ Page 1 of 7 Murashige, Laura COMM 4E/ PkOUNCJZ. From: JACK WEBER[jackadamweber @gmail.com] Sent: Tuesday, December 06,2011 12:56 AM To: mayor @honolulu.gov; phoffman @co.hawaii.hi.us Cc: counciltestimony @co.hawaii.hi.us;cohmayor @co.hawaii.hi.us;dyagong @co.hawaii.hi.us;dikeda @co.hawaii.hi.us; jyoshimoto @co.hawaii.hi.us;donishi @co.hawaii.hi.us;fblas @co.hawaii.hi.us; bsmart@co.hawaii.hi.us; bford @co.hawaii.hi.us;apilago @co.hawaii.hi.us;vchung @honolulu.gov;tberg @honolulu.gov;emartin @honolulu.gov; ianderson @honolulu.gov;ccldistrict4 @honolulu.gov;akobayashi @honolulu.gov;tgabbard @honolulu.gov; rcachola @honolulu.gov; bharimoto @honolulu.gov; ngarcia @honolulu.gov Subject: Re:Jack A.Weber testimony for mandatory GMO labeling in Hawai'i Attachments: Hawaii GMO labeling testimony.docx Please find attached(and printed below)my testimony in favor of mandatory labeling for GMO foods in Hawaii.Please review my extensively researched documentations for the hazards liabilities,and labeling justifications for GMO foods Thank you for your consideration. Sincerely,Jack Adam Weber **************** c) On Submitted by: a c-� O Jack Adam Weber,L.Ac.,Dipl,A.C.,C.H. o• P.O. Box 2130 a Wr r rri co Pahoa HI 96778 O jackadamweber@gmail.com Re: Mandatory Labeling of GMO foods in Hawaii To whom it Concerns, December 5,2011 I submit this testimonial as an author and primary health care physician(Hawaii)in opposition to GMO foods. If GMO foods are to be on our shelves, at the very least, I want mandatory labeling of any foods with GMO ingredients.As a first order of concern regarding GMO foods, it is noteworthy that none of the GMO crops currently planted have been adequately tested for their long-tem health effects on mammals,let alone on humans. The emerging body of evidence on the short-term health effects is alarming. In this letter I outline these many health dangers of GMO foods. To begin,the following information was collected by author and GMO researcher,Jeffrey Smith. The footnotes refer to page numbers in his book,Seeds of Deception. "The biotech industry claims that the FDA has thoroughly evaluated GM foods and found them safe.This is untrue. Internal FDA documents made public from a lawsuit,reveal that agency scientists warned that GM foods might create toxins, allergies,nutritional problems,and new diseases that might be difficult to identify.131-140 Although they urged their superiors to require long-term tests on each GM variety prior to approval,the political appointees at the agency, including a former 12/6/2011 Page 2 of 7 attorney for Monsanto,ignored the scientists.Official policy claims that the foods are no different130 and do NOT require safety testing.A manufacturer can introduce a GM food without even informing the government or consumers.146 A January 2001 report from an expert panel of the Royal Society of Canada said it was"scientifically unjustifiable"136 to presume that GM foods are safe.Likewise,a 2002 report by the UK's Royal Society said that genetic modification"could lead to unpredicted harmful changes in the nutritional state of foods,"and recommended that potential health effects of GM foods be rigorously researched before being fed to pregnant or breast-feeding women,elderly people,those suffering from chronic disease,and babies.263 How could the government approve dangerous foods?A close examination reveals that industry manipulation and political collusion-not sound science-was the driving force. • Government employees who complained were harassed,stripped of responsibilities, or fired.7743 • Scientists were threatened.Evidence was stolen.Data was omitted or distorted. Some regulators even claimed they were offered bribes to approve a GM product." Next,most of the countries in the European Union(EU)and countries around the world have mandatory labeling laws for GMO foods,despite having had GMO foods essentially forced into them by pressure from the office of then president George W.Bush. President Bush's office warned the EU that"some harm"would be done to the EU if they refused GMO foods. Despite this. Currently over 30 countries ban or propose to ban GMO foods.There is a reason for these widespread bans. Of primary concern is that no long-term studies have been made on the health effects of GMO foods. In fact,GMO crops were insubstantially and essentially illegally approved for implementation in the American food supply because initial safety tests were not performed with the actual GM proteins in GM crops but on approximations to those proteins. This sad reality was posted by the Institute of Science in Society: "...the evaluations of mammalian safety and environmental impacts(particularly the impact on non-target organisms)have been done using a bacterial surrogate for the proteins produced in GM crops.Consequently,GM crops produced in the United States,Canada and other countries are untested and unknown for toxicities,and the failure to label the GM foods produced from the GM crops has obscured any impact on humans and animals.Apparently,this makes the approval of the GM crops illegal." Contrary to what the biotech companies purported as a means to end world hunger,in reality the majority of GMO crops are not going towards feeding people,but rather to feeding animals for meat production.Additionally,Contrary to industry contention,GMOs have increased pesticide use and produced significantly lower yields than natural varieties. GMO crops have increased the use of herbicides and pesticides.The very purpose of RoundUp Ready GMO crops is to withstand large amounts of herbicide spraying,and each year farmers are now having to use more and more pounds of herbicide to combat resistant weeds,called superweeds. Super-bugs resistant to the Bt-toxin, another form of GMO modification that causes plants to produce endogenous pesticides as modifications of that produced by the soil bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis, are also on the rise.In several Midwest states whole crops of corn are being decimated by the Western rootworm beetle, Diabrotica virgifera virgifera,which has developed resistance to the Bt protein,Cry3Bbl. Scientific evidence is mounting for the severe adverse health effects of GMO foods. In one study,the RoundUp Ready gene from GMO foods was found to have transferred to the intestinal bacterial flora of the people tested, and were still active. This means that strange RoundUp Ready proteins,those that confer resistance to the same herbicide,are being produced in our intestines by the beneficial bacteria in our guts.Yuck. What may be even scarier is that no tests have been performed to see if the Bt-toxin(which is the GM insecticide from Bacillus thuringiensis in concentrated and modified form from that naturally occurring)can be transferred to the symbiotic bacteria in our digestive tracts. If it is transferred this means that these bacteria would be continually secreting this pesticide in our intestines. In another incident,Bt-toxin was also found in the bloodstream of fetuses and in pregnant and non-pregnant women. Upon taking blood samples,researchers detected the Bt Cry lAb toxin(one form of the Bt-toxin)in a shocking 93 percent of maternal and 80 percent of fetal blood samples.And 69 percent of non-pregnant women tested positive for the toxin in their blood. 12/6/2011 Page 3 of 7 Here is more verifiable and documented information on the effects of GMO compiled by The Institute for Responsible Technology: There are only about two dozen published,peer-reviewed animal feeding studies on the health effects of GM foods. • One study showed evidence of damage to the immune system and vital organs,and a potentially pre-cancerous condition.When the scientist tried to alert the public about these alarming discoveries,he lost his job and was silenced with threats of a lawsuit. • Two other studies also showed evidence of a potentially pre-cancerous condition.The other seven studies,which were superficial in their design,were not designed to identify these details. • In an unpublished study, laboratory rats fed a GM crop developed stomach lesions and seven of the forty died within two weeks. The crop was approved without further tests. Many industry studies appear to be rigged to find no problems.In the case of a genetically engineered bovine growth hormone(rbGH),for example,researchers injected cows with only one forty-seventh the normal dosage before reporting hormone residues in milk.They heated the milk 120 times longer than standard,to report that pasteurization destroys the hormone.They added cows to their study that were pregnant before treatment,to claim that rbGH didn't impede fertility. Cows that fell sick were dropped from studies altogether. With soybeans, serious nutritional differences between GM and natural soy were omitted from a published paper. Feeding studies masked any problems by using mature animals instead of developing ones and by diluting their GM soy 10 to 1 with non-GM protein. There are no adequate tests to verify that GM food will not create dangerous allergic reactions.While an international organization developed testing standards to minimize the possibility of allowing allergenic GM varieties on the market,GM corn currently sold in the U.S.has not been subjected to those tests and would most certainly fail them.One of these tests, for example,uses a test tube simulation to evaluate how long a potential GM allergen can last inside the digestive system before being broken down.Compared to the recommended international standards,however,one biotech company used a far stronger acid concentration and more than 1,250 times the recommended amount of a digestive enzyme to make the claim that their protein degrades too quickly to cause a reaction. The only human feeding trial ever conducted confirmed that genetically engineered genes from soy transferred to the bacteria inside the digestive tract.(The biotech industry had previously said that such a transfer was impossible.)The World Health Organization,the British and American Medical Associations,and several other groups have expressed concern that if the "antibiotic resistant marker genes"used in GM foods got transferred to bacteria,it could create super-diseases that are immune to antibiotics.59-6o More worrisome is that the"promoter"used inside GM foods could get transferred to bacteria or internal organs.Promoters act like a light switches,permanently turning on genes that might otherwise be switched off. Scientists believe that this might create unpredictable health effects,including the potentially pre-cancerous cell growth found in the animal feeding studies mentioned above. The biotech industry says that millions have been eating GM foods without ill effect.This is misleading. • About 100 people died and 5-10,000 to fell seriously ill when they consumed the food supplement L-tryptophan. Only those who consumed the variety that was genetically modified became ill. That brand had minute,but deadly contaminants that would easily pass through current regulations today.If the disease it created had not been rare and acute,with crippling and deadly symptoms,the GM supplement might never have been traced as the cause. Once discovered,however, industry and government covered up facts and diverted the blame. Even the FDA testimony before Congress withheld vital information. For a summary of the L-tryptophan issue,click here.For an in-depth presentation of the issue,see Toxic L-tryptophan: Shedding Light on a Mysterious Epidemic,by William E. Crist. 12/6/2011 Page4of7 • Milk from rbGH-treated cows contains an increased amount of the hormone IGF-1,which is one of the highest risk factors associated with breast and prostate cancer,among others. • Soy allergies skyrocketed by 50%in the UK,coinciding with the introduction of GM soy imports from the U.S. According to a March 2001 report,the Center for Disease Control says that food is responsible for twice the number of illnesses in the U.S. compared to estimates just seven years earlier. This increase roughly corresponds to the period when Americans have been eating GM food.Could that be contributing to the 5,000 deaths,325,000 hospitalizations,and 76 million illnesses related to food each year?Might it play in role in our national epidemic of obesity or the rise in diabetes or lymphatic cancers?We have no way of knowing if there is a connection because no one has looked for one. One of the most dangerous aspects of genetic engineering is the closed thinking and consistent effort to silence those with contrary evidence or concerns.Just before stepping down from office,former Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman admitted the following: "What I saw generically on the pro-biotech side was the attitude that the technology was good,and that it was almost immoral to say that it wasn't good,because it was going to solve the problems of the human race and feed the hungry and clothe the naked...And there was a lot of money that had been invested in this,and if you're against it,you're Luddites,you're stupid. That,frankly,was the side our government was on...You felt like you were almost an alien,disloyal,by trying to present an open-minded view" Contrast this with the warning by the editors of Nature Biotechnology: "The risks in biotechnology are undeniable,and they stem from the unknowable in science and commerce.It is prudent to recognize and address those risks,not compound them by overly optimistic or foolhardy behavior." The biotech industry and the government have been foolhardy indeed. Blinded,perhaps by the baseless myth that GM foods are needed to feed the world,they gamble with our health and support their safety claims on obsolete or unproven assumptions.Accepting their vacuous assurances by eating these dangerous foods or serving them to your customers may likewise be overly optimistic or foolhardy." In summary,here is a concise list of the primary dangers and problems with GMO foods: 1) GM foods have not been adequately tested for safety,both for preliminary safety and long-term safety 2) FDA cautions for the safety of GMO foods was ignored by political appointees when GMO foods were approved 3) GMO foods such as corn,soybean,cottonseed,and canola have genes from non-plant species forced into them which do not occur in nature.This is dangerous tampering with natural order. 4) Genetic engineering creates extensive mutations in hundreds of thousands of sites in plant's DNA which can lead to aberrant protein production leading to allergies and other auto-immune disorders. 5) Studies document that more herbicides and pesticides are used on GMO crops,which places dangerous poisons into our environment and food supply. 6) GM soy has been shown to cause allergies in greater frequency than natural soy,as cooked GM soy has 7 times the amount of a known soy allergen. 7) GM crops of soy,corn,and papaya contain proteins of known allergens.Bt-toxin corn and cotton cause allergic • reactions in farm workers,as it is thousands of times more concentrated than natural bacteria version. 8) GMOs can make you allergic to non-GMO foods by impairing digestive function,as tests on rats has demonstrated. 9) GMOs proved to injure the livers of rats fed GMO canola,potatoes, and soy. 12/6/2011 Page 5 of 7 10) GMOs have been shown to cause sterility,infant mortality,and maligned reproductive organs in rats. 11) Thousands of sheep,buffalo,and goats in India died after grazing on Bt cotton plants after harvest. Others suffered poor health and reproductive problems. 12) Farmers in Europe and Asia say that cows,water buffaloes,chickens,and horses died from eating Bt corn varieties. 13) About two dozen US fanners report that Bt corn varieties caused widespread sterility in pigs or cows. 14) The stomach lining of rats fed GM potatoes showed excessive cell growth,a condition that may lead to cancer. Rats also had damaged organs and immune systems. 15) If GM foods on the market are causing common diseases or if their effects appear only after long-term exposure,we may not be able to identify the source of the problem for decades, if at all.There is no monitoring of GMO-related illnesses and no long-term animal studies.Heavily invested biotech corporations are gambling with the health of our nation for their profit. 16) When the tipping point of consumer concern about GMOs was achieved in Europe in 1999,within a single week virtually all major food manufacturers committed to remove GM ingredients. 17) GMO foods were supposedly created to solve world hunger,but in fact statistics show that yields are often no better and even worse than non-GMO crops. 18) With the relatively recent development of resistant weeds and bugs to RoundUp and engineered Bt-toxin,the promise of GMO crops to benefit starvation are actually creating blight and the scary reality of super-weeds and super-bugs,much the same way that antibiotic-resistant super-bacteria are inadvertently bred even though antibiotic drugs are becoming more and more concentrated and powerful. 19) Bt toxins and Bt crops contain a fundamental flaw in their regulatory assessment—their toxicity testing is not based on the toxins in Bt crops themselves,but on surrogate toxins.This means that no tests have been performed on the actual Bt-toxins produced by the Bt-toxin GM plants. 20) GMO foods were introduced into the food supply not only with inadequate testing but under corrupt pretense by biotech colluding with biased and government officials and policy makers with vested financial interests in overlooking due diligence for the safety of GMO foods. The transnational companies that brought us Agent Orange,DDT,saccharin(i.e.,Nutrasweet),Aspartame,PCBs,and dioxins are now foisting GMOs onto the world. We all know the toxic legacy of these substances;their track record speaks volumes.How can we trust the safety of GMO foods given the history of poisonings from the creations of these companies, namely Monsanto?We cannot,especially in light of the voluminous and ever-growing body of scientific evidence both proving and suggesting their severe and long-lasting negative health effects. In five or ten years it is likely that we will look back on this era of genetically engineered foods with the same regret, �. shame and rue as we do with what we know now about the previous lethal creations cited just above.In my well-researched opinion,GMO foods are nothing less than a virulent cancer spreading across the globe. If GMO foods cannot be altogether banned for all the reasons mentioned in this letter,it is imperative that at the very least GMO foods be labeled so that consumers can do what we can to safeguard our health in the face of what in a few years will in all likelihood be determined to be one the greatest errors of human invention. I only hope that the destruction of our soils and pollution of our waterways from herbicides and pesticides(also produced by the companies who gift us GMO products)is not beyond the point of repair. I hope that the toxins from GMO foods have not permanently entered the lifecycle of humanity beyond the point of no-return.evidence suggests that these possibilities are increasingly possible, if not probable. I urge you then to support mandatory labeling of GMO foods, if only to begin to turn back the perilous course of inappropriate technology and to save our world from greed,manipulation,and the highly suspect generation of GMO foods. Thank you for your time and consideration. 12/6/2011 Page 6 of 7 Sincerely, Jack Adam Weber REFERENCES: http://wakeup-world.com/2011/10/18/our real-healthcare-crisis-the-devastating domino-effect-of-gmo_"foods-and-what-you- can-do-about-it/ http://www.i-si s.org.uk/GMcropslncreasedHerbicide.ph p http.://.w.ww_i-si s.org.uk/BTTIGMC.php http://www.responsibletechnology.org/health-risks http://www.responsibletechnology.org/gmo-dangers http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/31/beetle-mo_nsantos-genetically-modified-corn _n 944138.html hups://docs.google.com/viewer? a_v&pid=gmail&attid_0.1&t_hid=1340ede2f21b9277&mt=application/pdf&url=https://mail.google.com/mail/?uP/03D2% 26 i k%3Db2c 10a....bcbd%o26view%3 Datt%26th%3D 1340ede2f21 b9277%26attid%o3 DO..1%26disp%3 Dsafe% 2 6zw&sig—AHIEtbT1cFAHVBDHKnqu7HegNgbi2zARZA http://www.seedsofdeception.com/Public/AboutGeneticallyModifiedFoods/DangersofGenetical lyEngineeredFoods/index.cfm http://www.naturalnews.com/032407_Bt_insecticide_GMOs.html http://www.seedsofdeception.com/Public/AboutGeneticallyModified Foods/DangersofGeneticallyEngineeredFoods/index.cfin http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto 12/6/2011 Page 7 of 7 http://www.i-sis.org.uk/BTTIGMC.php http://voiceoftheenvironment.orgigmos/ k dm)) Wchcr, ■c.,Dip]. .\.C.,Cli. PO Box 2130 I',lima, I IT 96-8 WWW.PO elk'kaling.ann 12/6/20 1 1 Submitted by: Jack Adam Weber, L.Ac., Dipl,A.C., C.H. P.O. Box 2130 Pahoa HI 96778 jackadamweber @gmail.com Re: Mandatory Labeling of GMO foods in Hawaii To whom it Concerns, December 5, 2011 I submit this testimonial as an author and primary health care physician (Hawaii) in opposition to GMO foods. If GMO foods are to be on our shelves, at the very least, I want mandatory labeling of any foods with GMO ingredients.As a first order of concern regarding GMO foods, it is noteworthy that none of the GMO crops currently planted have been adequately tested for their long-tern health effects on mammals, let alone on humans. The emerging body of evidence on the short-term health effects is alarming. In this letter I outline these many health dangers of GMO foods. To begin,the following information was collected by author and GMO researcher,Jeffrey Smith. The footnotes refer to page numbers in his book,Seeds of Deception. "The biotech industry claims that the FDA has thoroughly evaluated GM foods and found them safe. This is untrue. Internal FDA documents made public from a lawsuit, reveal that agency scientists warned that GM foods might create toxins, allergies, nutritional problems, and new diseases that might be difficult to identify.131-140 Although they urged their superiors to require long-term tests on each GM variety prior to approval,the political appointees at the agency, including a former attorney for Monsanto, ignored the scientists. Official policy claims that the foods are no different138 and do NOT require safety testing.A manufacturer can introduce a GM food without even informing the government or consumers.146 A January 2001 report from an expert panel of the Royal Society of Canada said it was "scientifically unjustifiable"136 to presume that GM foods are safe. Likewise, a 2002 report by the UK's Royal Society said that genetic modification "could lead to unpredicted harmful changes in the nutritional state of foods," and recommended that potential health effects of GM foods be rigorously researched before being fed to pregnant or breast-feeding women, elderly people, those suffering from chronic disease, and babies.263 How could the government approve dangerous foods?A close examination reveals that industry manipulation and political collusion-not sound science-was the driving force. • Government employees who complained were harassed, stripped of responsibilities, or fired.77-83 • Scientists were threatened. Evidence was stolen. Data was omitted or distorted. Some regulators even claimed they were offered bribes to approve a GM product." Next, most of the countries in the European Union (EU) and countries around the world have mandatory labeling laws for GMO foods, despite having had GMO foods essentially forced into them by pressure from the office of then president George W. Bush. President Bush's office warned the EU that"some harm" would be done to the EU if they refused GMO foods. Despite this. Currently over 30 countries ban or propose to ban GMO foods. • There is a reason for these widespread bans. Of primary concern is that no long- term studies have been made on the health effects of GMO foods. In fact, GMO crops were insubstantially and essentially illegally approved for implementation in the American food supply because initial safety tests were not performed with the actual GM proteins in GM crops but on approximations to those proteins. This sad reality was posted by the Institute of Science in Society: "...the evaluations of mammalian safety and environmental impacts (particularly the impact on non-target organisms) have been done using a bacterial surrogate for the proteins produced in GM crops. Consequently, GM crops produced in the United States, Canada and other countries are untested and unknown for toxicities, and the failure to label the GM foods produced from the GM crops has obscured any impact on humans and animals.Apparently, this makes the approval of the GM crops illegal." Contrary to what the biotech companies purported as a means to end world hunger, in reality the majority of GMO crops are not going towards feeding people, but rather to feeding animals for meat production.Additionally, Contrary to industry contention, GMOs have increased pesticide use and produced significantly lower yields than natural varieties. GMO crops have increased the use of herbicides and pesticides. The very purpose of RoundUp Ready GMO crops is to withstand large amounts of herbicide spraying, and each year farmers are now having to use more and more pounds of herbicide to combat resistant weeds, called superweeds. Super-bugs resistant to the Bt- toxin, another form of GMO modification that causes plants to produce endogenous pesticides as modifications of that produced by the soil bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis, are also on the rise. In several Midwest states whole crops of corn being decimated by the Western rootworm beetle, Diabrotica virgifera virgifera,which has developed resistance to the Bt protein, Cry3Bbl. Scientific evidence is mounting for the severe adverse health effects of GMO foods. In one study, the RoundUp Ready gene from GMO foods was found to have transferred to the intestinal bacterial flora of the people tested, and were still active. This means that strange RoundUp Ready proteins,those that confer resistance to the same herbicide, are being produced in our intestines by the beneficial bacteria in our guts. Yuck. What may be even scarier is that no tests have been performed to see if the Bt- toxin (which is the GM insecticide from Bacillus thuringiensis in concentrated and modified form from that naturally occurring) can be transferred to the symbiotic bacteria in our digestive tracts. If it is transferred this means that these bacteria would be continually secreting this pesticide in our intestines. In another incident, Bt-toxin was also found in the bloodstream of fetuses and in ti pregnant and non-pregnant women. Upon taking blood samples, researchers detected the Bt CrylAb toxin (one form of the Bt-toxin) in a shocking 93 percent of maternal and 80 percent of fetal blood samples.And 69 percent of non-pregnant women tested positive for the toxin in their blood. Here is more verifiable and documented information on the effects of GMO compiled by The Institute for Responsible Technology: There are only about two dozen published, peer-reviewed animal feeding studies on the health effects of GM foods. • One study showed evidence of damage to the immune system and vital organs, and a potentially pre-cancerous condition.When the scientist tried to alert the public about these alarming discoveries,he lost his job and was silenced with threats of a lawsuit. • Two other studies also showed evidence of a potentially pre-cancerous condition. The other seven studies,which were superficial in their design,were not designed to identify these details. • In an unpublished study, laboratory rats fed a GM crop developed stomach lesions and seven of the forty died within two weeks. The crop was approved without further tests. Many industry studies appear to be rigged to find no problems. In the case of a genetically engineered bovine growth hormone (rbGH), for example, researchers injected cows with only one forty-seventh the normal dosage before reporting hormone residues in milk. They heated the milk 120 times longer than standard,to report that pasteurization destroys the hormone. They added cows to their study that were pregnant before treatment,to claim that rbGH didn't impede fertility. Cows that fell sick were dropped from studies altogether. With soybeans, serious nutritional differences between GM and natural soy were omitted from a published paper. Feeding studies masked any problems by using mature animals instead of developing ones and by diluting their GM soy 10 to 1 with non-GM protein. There are no adequate tests to verify that GM food will not create dangerous allergic reactions.While an international organization developed testing standards to minimize the possibility of allowing allergenic GM varieties on the market, GM corn currently sold in the U.S. has not been subjected to those tests and would most certainly fail them. One of these tests, for example, uses a test tube simulation to evaluate how long a potential GM allergen can last inside the digestive system before being broken down. Compared to the recommended international standards, however, one biotech company used a far stronger acid concentration and more than 1,250 times the recommended amount of a digestive enzyme to make the claim that their protein degrades too quickly to cause a reaction. The only human feeding trial ever conducted confirmed that genetically engineered genes from soy transferred to the bacteria inside the digestive tract. (The biotech industry had previously said that such a transfer was impossible.) The World Health Organization, the British and American Medical Associations, and several other groups have expressed concern that if the "antibiotic resistant marker genes" used in GM foods got transferred to bacteria,it could create super-diseases that are immune to antibiotics.59-60 More worrisome is that the "promoter" used inside GM foods could get transferred to bacteria or internal organs. Promoters act like a light switches, permanently turning on genes that might otherwise be switched off. Scientists believe that this might create unpredictable health effects, including the potentially pre-cancerous cell growth found in the animal feeding studies mentioned above. The biotech industry says that millions have been eating GM foods without ill effect. This is misleading. • About 100 people died and 5-10,000 to fell seriously ill when they consumed the food supplement L-tryptophan. Only those who consumed the variety that was genetically modified became ill.That brand had minute, but deadly contaminants that would easily pass through current regulations today. If the disease it created had not been rare and acute,with crippling and deadly symptoms,the GM supplement might never have been traced as the cause. Once discovered, however, industry and government covered up facts and diverted the blame. Even the FDA testimony before Congress withheld vital information. For a summary of the L-tryptophan issue, click here. For an in-depth presentation of the issue, see Toxic L-tryptophan: Shedding Light on a Mysterious Epidemic, by William E. Crist. • Milk from rbGH-treated cows contains an increased amount of the hormone IGF-1, which is one of the highest risk factors associated with breast and prostate cancer, among others. • Soy allergies skyrocketed by 50% in the UK, coinciding with the introduction of GM soy imports from the U.S. According to a March 2001 report,the Center for Disease Control says that food is responsible for twice the number of illnesses in the U.S. compared to estimates just seven years earlier. This increase roughly corresponds to the period when Americans have been eating GM food. Could that be contributing to the 5,000 deaths, 325,000 hospitalizations, and 76 million illnesses related to food each year? Might it play in role in our national epidemic of obesity or the rise in diabetes or lymphatic cancers?We have no way of knowing if there is a connection because no one has looked for one. One of the most dangerous aspects of genetic engineering is the closed thinking and consistent effort to silence those with contrary evidence or concerns. Just before stepping down from office, former Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman admitted the following: "What I saw generically on the pro-biotech side was the attitude that the technology was good, and that it was almost immoral to say that it wasn't good, because it was going to solve the problems of the human race and feed the hungry and clothe the naked...And there was a lot of money that had been invested in this, and if you're against it,you're Luddites,you're stupid.That, frankly,was the side our government was on...You felt like you were almost an alien, disloyal, by trying to present an open-minded view" Contrast this with the warning by the editors of Nature Biotechnology: "The risks in biotechnology are undeniable, and they stem from the unknowable in science and commerce. It is prudent to recognize and address those risks, not compound them by overly optimistic or foolhardy behavior." The biotech industry and the government have been foolhardy indeed. Blinded, perhaps by the baseless myth that GM foods are needed to feed the world, they gamble with our health and support their safety claims on obsolete or unproven assumptions.Accepting their vacuous assurances by eating these dangerous foods or serving them to your customers may likewise be overly optimistic or foolhardy." In summary, here is a concise list of the primary dangers and problems with GMO foods: 1) GM foods have not been adequately tested for safety, both for preliminary safety and long-term safety 2) FDA cautions for the safety of GMO foods was ignored by political appointees when GMO foods were approved 3) GMO foods such as corn, soybean, cottonseed, and canola have genes from non-plant species forced into them which do not occur in nature. ti This is dangerous tampering with natural order. 4) Genetic engineering creates extensive mutations in hundreds of thousands of sites in plant's DNA which can lead to aberrant protein production leading to allergies and other auto-immune disorders. 5) Studies document that more herbicides and pesticides are used on GMO crops,which places dangerous poisons into our environment and food supply. 6) GM soy has been shown to cause allergies in greater frequency than natural soy, as cooked GM soy has 7 times the amount of a known soy allergen. 7) GM crops of soy, corn, and papaya contain proteins of known allergens. Bt-toxin corn and cotton cause allergic reactions in farm workers, as it is thousands of times more concentrated than natural bacteria version. 8) GMOs can make you allergic to non-GMO foods by impairing digestive function, as tests on rats has demonstrated. 9) GMOs proved to injure the livers of rats fed GMO canola, potatoes, and soy. 10) GMOs have been shown to cause sterility, infant mortality, and maligned reproductive organs in rats. 11) Thousands of sheep, buffalo,and goats in India died after grazing on Bt cotton plants after harvest. Others suffered poor health and reproductive problems. 12) Farmers in Europe and Asia say that cows,water buffaloes, chickens, and horses died from eating Bt corn varieties. 13) About two dozen US farmers report that Bt corn varieties caused widespread sterility in pigs or cows. 14) The stomach lining of rats fed GM potatoes showed excessive cell growth, a condition that may lead to cancer. Rats also had damaged organs and immune systems. 15) If GM foods on the market are causing common diseases or if their effects appear only after long-term exposure,we may not be able to identify the source of the problem for decades, if at all. There is no monitoring of GMO-related illnesses and no long-term animal studies. Heavily invested biotech corporations are gambling with the health of our nation for their profit. 16) When the tipping point of consumer concern about GMOs was achieved in Europe in 1999,within a single week virtually all major food manufacturers committed to remove GM ingredients. 17) GMO foods were supposedly created to solve world hunger, but in fact statistics show that yields are often no better and even worse than non- GMO crops. 18) With the relatively recent development of resistant weeds and bugs to Roundup and engineered Bt-toxin,the promise of GMO crops to benefit starvation are actually creating blight and the scary reality of super- weeds and super-bugs, much the same way that antibiotic-resistant super-bacteria are inadvertently bred even though antibiotic drugs are becoming more and more concentrated and powerful. 19) Bt toxins and Bt crops contain a fundamental flaw in their regulatory assessment—their toxicity testing is not based on the toxins in Bt crops themselves, but on surrogate toxins. This means that no tests have been performed on the actual Bt-toxins produced by the Bt-toxin GM plants. 20) GMO foods were introduced into the food supply not only with inadequate testing but under corrupt pretense by biotech colluding with biased and government officials and policy makers with vested financial interests in overlooking due diligence for the safety of GMO foods. The transnational companies that brought us Agent Orange, DDT, saccharin (i.e., Nutrasweet),Aspartame, PCBs, and dioxins are now foisting GMOs onto the world.We all know the toxic legacy of these substances; their track record speaks volumes. How can we trust the safety of GMO foods given the history of poisonings from the creations of these companies, namely Monsanto?We cannot, especially in light of the voluminous and ever-growing body of scientific evidence both proving and suggesting the severe and long-lasting. In five or ten years it is likely that we will look back on this era of genetically engineered foods with the same regret, shame and rue as we do with what we know now about the previous lethal creations cited just above. In my well-researched opinion, GMO foods are nothing less than a virulent cancer spreading across the globe If GMO foods cannot be altogether banned for all the reasons mentioned in this letter,it is imperative that at the very least GMO foods be labeled so that consumers can do what we can to safeguard our health in the face of what in a few years will in all likelihood be determined to be one the greatest errors of human invention. I only hope that the destruction of our soils and pollution of our waterways from herbicides and pesticides (also produced by the companies who gift us GMO products) is not beyond the point of repair. I hope that the toxins from GMO foods have not permanently entered the lifecycle of humanity beyond the point of no-return. evidence suggests that these possibilities are increasingly possible, if not probable. I urge you then to support mandatory labeling of GMO foods, if only to begin to turn back the perilous course of inappropriate technology and to save our world from greed, manipulation, and the highly suspect generation of GMO foods. Thank you for your time and consideration. Sincerely, Jack Adam Weber REFERENCES: http://wakeup-world.com/2011/10/18/our-real-healthcare-crisis-the-devastating-domino- effect-of-gmo-"foods-and-what-you-can-do-about-it/ http://www.i-sis.org.uk/GMcropsIncreasedHerbicide.php http://www.i-sis.org.uk/BTTIGMC.php http://www.responsibletechnology.org/health-risks http://www.responsibletechnology.org/gmo-dangers http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/31/beetle-monsantos-genetically- modified-corn n 944138.html https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=gmail&attid=0.1&thid=1340ede2f21b92 77&mt=application/pdf&url=https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui%3D2%26ik%3Db2 cl0abcbd%26view%3Datt%26th%3D1340ede2f21b9277%26attid%3D0.1%26dis p()/03Dsafe%26zw&sig=AHIEtbTlcFAHVBDHKnqu7HegNgbi2zARZA http://www.seedsofdeception.com/Public/AboutGeneticallyModifiedFoods/Danger sofGeneticallyEngineeredFoods/index.cfm http://www.naturalnews.com/032407 Bt insecticide GMOs.html http://www.seedsofdeception.com/Public/AboutGeneticallyModifiedFoods/Danger sofGeneticallyEngineeredFoods/index.cfm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto http://www.i-sis.org.uk/BTTIGMC.php http://voiceoftheenvironment.org/gmos/ Plcouwcu. COUNTY CLERK ti�r�14�%�; COUNT" CF i !'iv A1I Testimony for GMO labeling 12/7/11 20H DEC -7 PM 12: L16 My name is Jack Weber; I am a primary healthcare physician in Hawaii specializing in digestive disorders. I became especially interested in GMOs, or GM foods,when I began seeing symptoms in my patients that were different than what I had previously witnessed. Stomach upset, nausea, persistent coughs, intestinal griping, bloating, irritability, fatigue, skin rashes, diarrhea, and muscle aches, all subsided when my patients began switching over to a non-GMO diet. Without GMO labeling, the only way my patients and others can be assured of eating non-GMO is to buy certified organic food. But they should also have the right to buy commercially produced food that is guaranteed to be non-GMO and the only way to do that is to label GMO containing foods. My initial discoveries began over a decade ago, and to this day I recommend a non GMO diet to all my patients with these symptoms. In fact, for the last many years I have been advising all my patients, regardless of their condition, to avoid GM foods in their diet.This advice is in keeping with the American Academy of Environmental Medicine (AAEM) recommendation that all physicians advise their patients to avoid GM foods. The AAEM cites, "Several animal studies indicate serious health risks associated with genetically modified (GM) food," including infertility, immune problems, accelerated aging, faulty insulin regulation, and changes in major organs and the gastrointestinal system." As I researched GM foods I discovered many scientifically proven facts that I want to share with you here today. Of particular relevance to my practice is the documented fact that cooked GMO soybeans contain 7 times more allergens than non-GMO varieties. No wonder my patients improved so drastically when they went off GMO soybeans by only consuming organic soy products. The digestive symptoms I just mentioned,however, may be relatively benign side-effects of GM foods. GM foods are actually similar to pharmaceutical drugs, and ordinary food should not have side-effects. No one would consider inserting pharmaceutical drugs into our food supply would they?At least not without a warning.And this warning is what labeling of GM foods will provide by way of a simple unbiased announcement on the label of foods. A New York Times blog poll (item 2) shows that 83 percent of US consumers are bothered by the presence of GMOs in food; 89 percent want to see labeling of such foods; about 85 percent would like to see stricter regulations; and nearly three- fourths would buy less salmon if it were GM. Clearly the biotech companies have some profits to lose here, but endangering public health should not hinge on the profits of mega-corporations. Perhaps it would be helpful to remember that the same people who have been giving us GM foods are the ones who also gave us Agent orange, DDT, PCBs, dioxin, saccharin, and aspartame—all of which are highly toxic and have caused untold damage to millions and millions of innocent people. Indeed, some, if not all, of these substances were at one time believed to be safe for humans.We know differently now. In years to come we may be at the same precipice of shame, regret, and remorse as we look back on the many years during which GMO food were not labeled, much less allowed to be in our food supply.We need to prevent that day t from becoming reality by doing whatever we can safeguard ordinary people like you and me. As it stands, no long-term health studies have been performed on humans demonstrating the efficacy of GM foods. I even read that biotech companies will only sell seeds to anyone, including government agencies, under the agreement that no tests be performed on them. In the one scientifically documented GMO human study I researched,the bacterial flora of test subjects was found to be producing the RoundUp-resistant proteins that the GM plants produce to make them RoundUp resistant, or RoundUp Ready. A recent scientific study in Canada demonstrated that Bt-toxin(the endogenous pesticide that some GM plants such as corn, potatoes and cotton are genetically modified to produce), was also found in the bloodstream of fetuses and in pregnant and non- pregnant women. Upon taking blood samples, researchers detected the Bt-toxin in a shocking 93 percent of maternal and 80 percent of fetal blood samples.And 69 percent of non-pregnant women tested positive for the toxin in their blood.This demonstrates that the Bt-toxin is not broken down in the digestive process, as Monsanto claimed in order to get their Bt-toxin GMOs approved. If this were not bad enough, Bt toxins and Bt crops contain a fundamental flaw in their regulatory assessment—their toxicity testing is not based on the toxins in Bt crops themselves, but on surrogate toxins. This means that no tests have been performed on the actual Bt-toxins produced by the modified plants,just on chemically similar compounds. The reason for this is that the agency responsible for mandating the test discovered that it was cost prohibitive to test the actual toxins produced by the GM plants. This, in a sense, makes all Bt-toxin modified GM foods illegal in the first place. This brings up another point I discovered in my research. "The biotech industry claims that the FDA has thoroughly evaluated GM foods and found them safe. This is untrue. Internal FDA documents made public from a lawsuit, reveal that agency scientists warned that GM foods might create toxins, allergies, nutritional problems, and new diseases that might be difficult to identify.Although they urged their superiors to require long-term tests on each GM variety prior to approval, the political appointees at the agency, including a former attorney for Monsanto, ignored the scientists. Official policy claims that the foods are no different and do NOT require safety testing.A manufacturer can introduce a GM food without even informing the government or consumers.A January 2001 report from an expert panel of the Royal Society of Canada said it was "scientifically unjustifiable"136 to presume that GM foods are safe. Likewise,a 2002 report by the UK's Royal Society said that genetic modification "could lead to unpredicted harmful changes in the nutritional state of foods," and recommended that potential health effects of GM foods be rigorously researched before being fed to pregnant or breast-feeding women, elderly people, those suffering from chronic disease, and babies. GMO crops,because they are RoundUp ready, means that they can withstand massive amounts of the toxic herbicide RoundUp.This not only means a heavier dose of dangerous chemicals for the consumer of these products, but means more poisons dumped onto our land and into our waterways. Consumers have a right to know about foods that are more heavily laced with immune-system deregulating herbicides and insecticides. So, in one sense,we should not even be here today discussing labeling regulations for a product that should not be in our food supply to begin with. When these dubious foods show the alarming statistics that I have compiled in my written testimony(compiled and submitted separately),we should all be concerned, if not outraged. Mandatory labeling of GMO foods should be a no-brainer.And,just like the more than 30 countries that currently ban, or are proposing to ban, GMO foods, considerations for banning GMO foods altogether should be the next sane consideration for Hawaii and the United States. The costs to the consumer of labeling GMO products, contrary to biotechnology industry's contention,will be limited. Biotech companies attest that labeling will cost them and consumers too much money. The average price increase that a consumer should expect to pay as a result of GMO labeling is $5 or 0.25% annual increase per person. This figure is derived from the average of 5 major studies done in Canada,Australia, New Zealand, the UK and Oregon,where biotech corporations were not the party paying for the studies.With the exception of Oregon,these studies were commissioned by the national and local governments of these regions. On the other hand, studies which had biotech industry influence averaged an annual price increase of$108 or 3.7% per person, a figure significantly higher and inconsistent with unbiased study results.Just because it might cost a little bit more to label foods with GMO ingredients, no cost increase justifies not labeling food that is dangerous to human health.An ounce of prevention is worth of pound of cure. This testimony is a fraction of what I wanted to say to you today.The seven- page outline describing the dangers and existing scientific studies on GMOs, as well as the officially documented deceptions of the GMO biotech companies—not the least of which is their utterly inadequate testing of their genetically modified compounds such as the RoundUp-resistant protein and the Bt-toxin—I submitted in writing is also a fraction of the necessary information needed to fully comprehend the obscene truths of GM foods and the companies who provide them. The fact that GM foods are in our food supply and are currently undisclosed on food labels is cruel and unjust. Until the full truth of GM foods is revealed, mandatory labeling of GM foods is a must.We do not want to be looking back on this day two,three, five years from now wishing that we had acted in a way that could uphold the integrity of community health and even save the planet from the multi-tiered dangers of GMO foods. NYT labeling poll source: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/15/why- arent-g-m-o-foods-labeled/ G Mode i #" RTX-6510:: No.ofPagesB Reproductive Toxicology xxx(201 1)xxx--xxx Contents lists available at ScienceDirect l Reproductive Toxicology journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/reprotox Maternal and fetal exposure to pesticides associated to genetically modified ► foods in Eastern Townships of Quebec, Canada Aziz Arisa.b.c.is, Samuel Leblancc Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology University of Sherbrooke Hospital Centre,Sherbrooke,Quebec,Canada Clinical Research Centre of Sherbrooke University Hospital Centre,Sherbrooke,Quebec,Canada Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences,University of S Sherbrooke,Sherbrooke,Quebec,Canada f ' -- f A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T Article history: Pesticides associated to genetically modified foods(PAGMF),are engineered to tolerate herbicides such as Received 29 June 2010 glyphosate(GLYP)and gluphosinate(GLUF)or insecticides such as the bacterial toxin bacillus thuringien- Received in revised form 26 January 2011 sis(Bt).The aim of this study was to evaluate the correlation between maternal and fetal exposure,and Accepted 13 February 2011 to determine exposure levels of GLYP and its metabolite aminomethyl phosphoric acid(AMPA),GLUF Available online xxx and its metabolite 3-methylphosphinicopropionic acid(3-MPPA)and CrylAb protein(a Bt toxin)in East- . ern Townships of Quebec,Canada.Blood of thirty pregnant women(PW)and thirty-nine nonpregnant Keywords: women(NPW)were studied.Serum GLYP and GLUF were detected in NPW and not detected in PW. Pregnant women Maternal and fetal blood Serum 3-MPPA and CryAbl toxin were detected in PW,their fetuses and NPW.This is the first study to Nonpregnant women reveal the presence of circulating PAGMF in women with and without pregnancy,paving the way for a Genetically modified foods new field in reproductive toxicology including nutrition and utero-placental toxicities. Glyphosate ©2011 Elsevier Inc.All rights reserved. • Gluphosinate CrylAb • 1. Introduction wo:idwide. Global areas of these GMP increased from 1.7 mil- " lion hectares in.1996 to 134 million hectares in 2009, a 80-fold An optimal exchange across the maternal-fetal unit (MFU) is increase [6]. This growth rate makes GMP the fastest adopted 1 necessary for a successful pregnancy.The placenta plays a major crop technology [6]. GMP are plants in which genetic material role in the embryo's nutrition and growth,in the regulation of the has been altered in a way that does not occur naturally. Genetic endocrine functions and in drug biotransformation[1-3].Exchange engineering allows gene transfer(transgenesis)from an organism involves not only physiological constituents, but also substances into another in order to confer them new traits.Combining GMP that represent a pathological risk for the fetus such as xenobiotics with pesticides-associated GM foods(PAGMF)allows the protec- that include drugs, food additives,pesticides,and environmental tion of desirable crops and the elimination of unwanted plants pollutants [4]. The understanding of what xenobiotics do to the by reducing the competition for nutrients or by providing insect MFU and what the MFU does to the xenobiotics should provide resistance. There is a debate on the direct threat of genes used the basis for the use of placenta as a tool to investigate and predict in the preparation of these new foods on human health, as they some aspects of developmental toxicity[4].Moreover,pathological are not detectable in the body, but the real danger may come conditions in the placenta are important causes of intrauterine or from PAGMF [6-10]. Among the innumerable PAGME, two cate- perinatal death,congenital anomalies,intrauterine growth retarda- gories are largely used in our agriculture since their introduction in tion,maternal death,and a great deal of morbidity for both,mother 1996:(1)residues derived from herbicide-tolerant GM crops such • and child[5]. as glyphosate (GLYP) and its metabolite aminomethyl phospho- Genetically modified plants (GMP) were first approved for ric acid(AMPA)[11],and gluphosinate ammonium(GLUF)and its commercialization in Canada in 1996 then become distributed metabolite 3-methylphosphinicopropionic acid(MPPA) [12]; and (2)residues derived from insect-resistant GM crops such as CrylAb protein[13,14]. Among herbicide-tolerant GM crops, the first to be grown t" *Corresponding author at:Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology,University commercially were soybeans which were modified to tolerate of Sherbrooke Hospital Centre,3001,12e Avenue Nord,Sherbrooke,Quebec,Canada glyphosate [11]. Glyphosate [N-(phosphonomethyl) glycine] is a j 1 H 5N4.Tel.:+1 819 820 6868x12538:fax:+1 819 564 5302. E-mail address:aziz.aris @usherbrooke.ca(A.Aris). nonselective,post-emergence herbicide used for the control of a ( 0890-6238/s-see front matter©2011 Elsevier Inc.All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.reprotox.201 1.02.004 • Please cite this article in press as:Aris A.Leblanc 5.Maternal and fetal exposure to pesticides associated to genetically modified foods in Eastern Townships of Quebec.Canada.Reprod Toxicol(2011),doi:10.1016jj.reprotox2011.02.004 Summary of Major Studies Non Industry Influenced Industry Influenced 2000 UK 2000 2000 New 2002 2007 2000 2002 Australia Zealand Oregon#1 Quebec Canada Oregon#2 Researcher National KPMG KPMG Professor Professor KPMG Northbridg Economic Jaeger, Cloutier, Consulting e Environ. l+" Research Oregon St. Unv. of Consultant Associates Economics Quebec s Client/Type UK Gov., Gov. Aust./ Gov. Aust./ Independe Gov. Gov.• Coalition Food NZ NZ nt Study Quebec Policy Against Standards Ministry of Steering Costly Agency Agriculture, Committee Labeling Fisheries (mainly Law (GMO, and Food GMO and large food • big ag) corps, etc.) Annual Per $0.23-$4 $10 $3 $3-$10 $6 (b) $35-$48 $45 Capita Cost $138 Likely Increase (a) _ $275 _ Annual % 0.01%- 0.75% 0.2% 0.10%- 0.2% (b) 1.3%- 1.5% Cost 0.17% 0.35% 1.8% 4.7% Likely Increase (a) _ 9.4% Annual Total $13.8 - $165 - $18 mil $10.5 - $30 mil+ --- --- Societal $232 mil $173 mil $35 mil (one time Cost $161 mil) 40, Increase (c) ,■ Annual $13.5 $165 mil $18 mil --- $150 mil Total Price $231 mil • $470 mil Increase to $920 mil Consumers _ Annual Total $0.2- $0.4- $0.2 mil $0.1 - $1.7 mil --- $11.3 mil + Cost to $0.6 mil $8 mil $1.25 mil (one time Government $6 mil) (d) • Population 59 mil 19 mil 3.8 mil 3.5 mil 7.5 mil 30 mil 3.5 mil (e) • Sources: • W.K. Jaeger. 2002. "Economic Issues and Oregon Ballot Measure 27:Labeling of Genetic Modified Foods"(Oregon St. Economics) National Economic Research Associates (NERA). 2001. "Economic Appraisal of Options For Extension of Legislation on GM Labelling"(A Final Report for the Foods Standard Agency, UK) ±r Northridge Environmental Management Consultants. 2002. "Econumic Implementation Analysis of Oregon Measure 27" ,f (Prepared for Coalition Against Costly Labeling Law) KPMG Consulting. 2000. "Phase I Report. Economic Impact Study:Potential Cost of Mandatory Labelling of Food 4 Products Derived From Biotechnology in Canada"(Prepared for Steering Committee; Economic Impacts of Mandatory Food Labelling Study) Greenpeace. 2007. "Executive summary of the economic study of the costs of mandatory labelling of GMOs in Quebec. Costs 85% lower than those claimed by industry" Footnotes: (a) Increases for total society including consumer and government except for Oregon#2 study which is for consumer only (b)Assumes depreciation of one time costs over 10 years (c)Annual Total Monetary Price Increase converted into dollars from foreign currency at then rates (d)Annual cost to government for Oregon#2 study conducted by Oregon Department of Administrative Services. Study assumes labeling to be conducted in restaurants as well • (e) Population at time.of study 3 4 .