The debate on the putative risks of genetically engineered plants (GMOs) has unfortunately not been based on the discussion of extant experimental data but is still limited to a fight of pro’s and con’s. One of the main reasons for this behaviour is the lack of an acceptable protocol of risk assessment by public agencies like EFSA.
According to the guidelines, GMO rat feeding experiments are only carried out for 90 days… and very few putative physiological or anatomical induced modifications are screened. The paper by Séralini et al. offers a new holistic vision of the differences between treated and untreated rats in the sense that not only survival but also numbers of tumours, anatomic, metabolic, physiological, and functional problems have been screened and all showed very clear differences between treated and control rats.
Danièle Clavel, CIRAD-BIOS, France
