GMO: Member of Parliament seizes the High Council of Biotechnologies
(AFP) - 17 hours ago
PARIS - Moselle MP UMP François Grosdidier has decided to refer the matter to the High Council for Biotechnology after the publication of a study on the suspected harmfulness of three varieties of GMO corn from the American seed company Monsanto, he announced Tuesday in a communicated.
"Particular effects on human health are very strongly suspected, in particular on the liver, kidneys and heart", he indicated, considering that "this confirms the merits of the moratorium" decided in France on Mon810 corn.
The three varieties of GMO corn concerned are Mon810, Mon863 and NK603.
It is "urgent to demand the extension of the precautionary principle to all these varieties of corn authorized for animal and human consumption in the European Union", estimated the deputy.
The conclusions of this study were published on December 11 by the independent Research and Information Committee on Genetic Engineering (Criigen, based in Caen) which participated.
"We have proven for the first time in the world that these GMOs are neither healthy nor sufficiently correct to be marketed", indicated Gilles-Eric Séralini, of the University of Caen, one of the authors of the study published in the International Journal of Biological Sciences.
Scientists have therefore called for a "firm ban" on the import and cultivation of these GMOs.
The recent study on the suspected harmfulness of three varieties of GMO corn from Monsanto does not provide "any new evidence", say Tuesday supporters of GMOs, gathered within the French Association of Plant Biotechnologies (Afbv).
The three GMOs concerned - Mon810, Mon863 and NK603 - have been authorized and cultivated all over the world for several years and "no health problem has ever been scientifically demonstrated", said the Afbv in a press release. .
This study "is in reality a new statistical analysis and a new interpretation of already existing data and somehow recycled and well known for a long time but is by no means the result of new experiments", assures the Afbv.
The study's academics have re-analyzed data provided by Monsanto to health authorities for the corn, which they obtained after a court ruling.
The Afbv association, created in June, is chaired by Professor Marc Fellous, specialist in human genetics and former president of the Commission for Biomolecular Engineering (CGB), an advisory body on the dissemination of GMOs, dissolved in 2007.
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