Tumour Pong: Fake Food Is Not Good

            Genetically modified foods, also known as transgenic foods, are the kind of nourishment which composition has been altered by adding some element provided by the genes transferred from another organism; this helps not only to prevent disasters caused by drought or plagues, but also to resist against herbicides. Furthermore, this genetic manipulation enables an increase in production—in both harvests and aliments for livestock—and durability, which means that it is possible for more people to obtain their provisions.

            However, many of us are aware about the controversy that transgenic foods have caused even from their beginning; production may have increased, yet costs have as well. In addition, these transformed products are the main cause of ecological disasters such as the death of numerous pollinators, resistance to antibiotics or secretion of toxic waste.

            According to a research conducted by the French scientist Gilles Eric Séralini, genetically manipulated food is not only potentially harmful for humans or insects, but it also is for animals such as rats; in the University of Caen, an experiment was being held with these little creatures who turned out to develop shocking tumours which had a size similar to a ping-pong ball.

            These laboratory rats had been fed their whole life with genetically altered corn from Monsanto (an American agricultural biotechnology industry) which grew from NK603, a variety of seeds that is resistant to herbicides such as “Roundup”—Monsanto’s own product. Unlike the lamentably diseased group, the rats that were fed with their usual diet lived longer.

            Given this concrete—and recent—state of affairs, do you still think that transgenic foods should stay in the market? Rats were the first grievous victims; what comes next? We cannot even trust in what we eat nowadays.