According to Bioceres (known as the Argentine Monsanto), 25 flour mills in Argentina are now using its transgenic glufosinate-tolerant wheat. So GMO bread is on Argentine tables without anyone choosing it, as the government gave it commercial approval without any obligation to label. Neighbourhood assemblies and socio-environmental organisations throughout Argentina and other Latin American countries have expressed their opposition to GMO wheat, as have more than 1,000 scientists in a letter denouncing the damaging impacts of the GMO/pesticide production model. Several lawsuits have been launched, including one by the main agro-export companies, which fear losing international markets because consumers do not want GMO wheat. The firms want its approval suspended because of irregularities, little transparency and no public consultation. TierraViva via @GMWatch on Twitter

 

 

Over the last decade, Dr Charles Limbach noticed something strange in his family medicine practice in Salinas, California. Kids between 5 and 15 years old showed elevated levels of liver enzymes, a sign of liver inflammation. Limbach ordered a panel of medical tests on each patient and repeatedly saw the same result: Fatty liver disease. “When I trained in family medicine here in Salinas about 30 years ago, fatty liver was never even mentioned,” Limbach said. Now a hundred kids in his practice have fatty liver disease, characterised by excess fat stored in the liver, which can lead to long-term liver damage. Spurred by Limbach’s observations, researchers at the UC Berkeley School of Public Health found in a just-published study that childhood exposure to glyphosate is linked to liver inflammation and metabolic syndrome in early adulthood. These conditions can lead to liver cancer, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. EHN

 

 

In his book, The Mutant Project: Inside the Global Race to Genetically Modify Humans, about how CRISPR was used to "edit" babies, the scholar Eben Kirksey explains how metaphors like gene editing actually hide messy cellular dynamics. Kirksey says an armed drone attack gives a more accurate comparison. Macmillan Books

 

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