Consequences Of Genetically Modified Foods

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In the last century the United States has gone from world wars to the battle against the fast food industry and Franken foods. 70% of all food products in the US today have genetically modified organisms or GMO which allows plants to be selectively bred or scientifically altered to produce the best crops available in the short growing season (Center for Science in the Public Interest). These crops, however, have unknown consequences such as increased allergies, reduction of plant diversity, and increasing the use of herbicide creating resistant weeds and health concerns. Just because our world is industrializing does not mean our food source should be.
The main concern with scientifically altered food is that no long term human testing has ever been done on GMOs. So why does food, which has never been tested, being consumed by people every day? In 2007 an experiment was done testing herbicide resistant soybeans. When given to rats it compromised the fertility and survivability of their offspring (Tzotzos 85). These mutated foods have unproven
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However, as of October 3, 2015 19 countries in Europe have banned the growing of genetically modified crops within their borders, targeting the only European GMO Monsanto’s maize corn MON 810 (Chow 2). Greenpeace’s food policy director Franziska Achterberg stated. “They don’t trust the E.U. (European Union) safety assessments and are rightly taking action to protect their agriculture and food.” The war against GMO in Europe has been ongoing for the last 5 years with constant legislation brought up in parliament to prohibit GM’s because the unidentified effects these crops could have on the population. Modified crops are monitored by both the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and World Health Organization (WHO) which have established international guild lines for testing food quality (Cuhra). The main

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