Friday, March 5, 2010

Fury as EU approves GM potato

Monsanto and Dow, et al, are spreading their billions around, and along with it their grotesque creations, often erroneously described as "food". Notice how all the corporations responsible for GM foods are, first and foremost, chemical companies; the company responsible for these GM potatoes, BASF, is a chemical company intimately linked to Monsanto. This is because the primary, although not sole, purpose of GM foods is so that the pesticides these corporations create (Monsanto's Round-up, etc) can be plastered all over the crops without killing the crops.

But then you eat them. So not only are they toxic inandof themselves, but they come with an extra helping of violently toxic pesticides.

    Critics claim plant could spread antibiotic-resistant diseases to humans

    London Independent -

    The introduction of a genetically modified potato in Europe risks the development of human diseases that fail to respond to antibiotics, it was claimed last night.

    German chemical giant BASF this week won approval from the European Commission for commercial growing of a starchy potato with a gene that could resist antibiotics – useful in the fight against illnesses such as tuberculosis.

    Farms in Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic may plant the potato for industrial use, with part of the tuber fed to cattle, according to BASF, which fought a 13-year battle to win approval for Amflora. But other EU member states, including Italy and Austria and anti-GM campaigners angrily attacked the move, claiming it could result in a health disaster.

    During the regulatory tussle over the potato, the EU's pharmaceutical regulator had expressed concern about its potential to interfere with the efficacy of antibiotics on infections that develop multiple resistance to other antibiotics, a growing problem in human and veterinary medicine. Amflora contains a gene that produces an enzyme which generally confers resistance to several antibiotics, including kanamycin, neomycin, butirosin, and gentamicin.

Read all of it.

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