SUPPRESSING THE UNCOMFORTABLE: MON(STER)SANTO AT IT AGAIN
When Ms. K.M., a regular reader here, sent me the following article, I read the headlines and article in disbelief, and it is so important I simply must include it in this week’s final cut, there is more evidence out, not only about GMOs and “inexplicable mechanisms” of genetic contamination, but of actual suppression of this fact and even hints at darker agendas:Muzzled by Monsanto Is Big Ag squelching research showing its new RNAi GMOs may be dangerous?
There are so many things to consider in this article one scarcely knows where to begin; for one thing, there is the fact that agribusiness and medicine appear to be working at cross-purposes:
“RNAi has applications in both the medical world and in agriculture. But these two worlds are not after the same thing when it comes to RNA. While the medical community is trying to perfect processes that will cause the human body to accept modified RNA strands, agriculture corporations working in the GMO field are busy trying to prove that their RNA strands can’t be assimilated by the human body at all.One could, in short, be looking at a whole new form of economic warfare: which corporate interest – big pharma and big medicine, and big agribusiness – can shovel more money into politicians’ coffers to buy more influence?
“For example, some microRNAs interfere with cell division and block cancer. These tumor suppressor RNAs are missing in cancer patients. If they can be replaced — an experimental treatment known as microRNA replacement therapy — then doctors could theoretically stop the proliferation of cancer cells. But in agriculture where RNA is being engineered as a pesticide designed to kill insects that feed on crops — such as Monsanto’s RNA efforts aimed at the Western corn rootworm, the most economically destructive pest in corn production — it is paramount that the RNA in and/or on the corn that is later eaten by humans doesn’t subsequently infiltrate our cells causing who knows what kind of unintended consequences.
“In short, the medical world needs the genetically modified RNA to be assimilated by our bodies and the agricultural world needs the opposite to occur.”
But I suspect the real concern behind Mon(ster)santo’s attitude to this research is the clear indication – yet again – that cross-kingdom genetic expression is possible by eating plants:
“In September of 2011, three months after Vance gave her presentation on RNAi at the ILSI conference, a team lead by Chen-Yu Zhang of Nanjing University in China published a paper in the journal Cell Research claiming that mammals (mice, in the case of their study) take up small RNAs when they eat plants, and those plant RNAs regulate expression of mammalian genes — something the science world refers to as trans-kingdom gene regulation.The truth of the matter, however, is that it had been though of before; Dr. de Hart my co-author, and I expressed such concerns in Transhumanism: A Grimoire of Alchemical Agendas, and I expressed it again on this website, a fact for which I was roundly criticized (once) by someone spouting scientisim-isms… until these types of papers started to appear.
“The team reported finding small RNA molecules in the bloodstream and tissue of mice and humans. They found that one particular molecule of RNA from rice could inhibit a protein that supports removal of low-density lipoprotein, or “bad” cholesterol from the blood. If such a finding proved to also be true for humans, it would potentially indicate that eating foods contain ing modified RNA could have major implications for heart disease and other health issues tied to cholesterol.
“’That had never been reported before. Nobody had thought about that,” says Vance. “What the hell, I mean, you’re eating a plant and taking in plant RNAs and they are regulating the expression of your genes? I think that has to be considered. … There’s been a lot of resistance to that paper. When something really unexpected like that comes up, there’s always a lot of resistance.”
Not surprisingly, the Chinese study was rejected, largely because its findings contradicted prevailing “wisdom”:
Resistance was apparent even before the Chinese study was published. The team’s manuscript was rejected by wellknown journals Science, Cell and Molecular Cell. Zhang told The Scientist Magazine it was because their discovery was “too extraordinary.”So whose “science” are we to believe: Mon(ster)santo’s entirely predictable conclusions (nothing to see here, folks, see? We did the science. Move along)? or China’s? corporate crapitalism’s? or Commu-crapitalism’s?
“Most of the people [who speculate about our work] just don’t believe it because the concept right now, I have to say, is broken by my results,” Zhang told Boulder Weekly in a recent interview from Nanjing. “They don’t want to believe until I have new data or the other groups reproduce some of our data. And of course some other people, for whatever reason I don’t want to say … I don’t want to even touch … they are just against our discovery no matter what it is.”
The work was so controversial that another preeminent journal, Nature Biotechnology, made a rather unusual move: They published a letter from a team detailing negative findings. In other words, it was a study that presents no new conclusions, only an unsuccessful attempt to recreate Zhang’s findings.
“[T]he new report, resulting from a collaboration between miRagen Therapeutics and Monsanto, clarifies what were controversial findings in [the Zhang study]. The latter study … sparked vigorous debate because it reported the presence of plant microR- NA in human blood plasma and suggested that one in particular, miRNA 168a, from ingested rice could traverse into the circulation of mice resulting in the modulation of miRNA target genes in the animal.”
The editorial goes on to say that the miRagen/ Monsanto study which used three different groups of mice for control and comparison, found no evidence of miRNA 168a in the plasma and liver tissue of mice fed a rice diet, and they attributed altered LDL levels in the animal blood to differences in the nutrition available to mice in different groups.
I would suggest that the Chinese study is not the only such study out there indicating potential dangers, but more importantly, I would suggest that common sense along would seem to dictate that one should err on the side of caution – and that would be the Chinese study – rather than telling your broker to buy more agribusiness shares.
In the article, biologist Vance goes on to indicate pressures put on her and her work from Mon(ster)santo, and then, towards the end of the article, she states something that made the hair on my neck stand on end, for she is implying a sinister possibility:
“A simple step, in Vance’s opinion, would be to engineer corn plants to only express specific RNA in the roots of the plant where the corn rootworm will feed, avoiding consumption by humans.At the least sinister level, expression in seeds is the game, it’s the basis of the profit system built into GMOS.
“’Why do they have to express their RNAi in corn seeds? They don’t have to. They could just put it in the roots – it wouldn’t be hard to do. Why don’t they just fix their freaking plants so they won’t be dangerous to people? Even if there’s some small chance it’s dangerous,’ Vance pauses as she has many times during conversations about Monsanto, clearly frustrated.
“’I just don’t understand the mindset,’ she sighs.”
…. I won’t mention the other possibility, the more sinister one… I’ll leave it to you to think it out.
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