The journal Food and Chemical Toxicology (FCT) wants to withdraw the article by Professor Seralini on rats fed GM maize NK603, which was published in September 2012. The researcher counters: why not retract the article by Monsanto in 2004 on the same subject?
The Associate Editor of the FCT is now Richard E. Goodman, a former Monsanto scientist and an affiliate of the GMO industry-funded group, the International Life Sciences Institute.
ARM WRESTLING. He has mustered his scientific and political supporters … A symbol. Surrounded notably by Paul Deheuvels, statistician of the Academy of Sciences and Corinne Lepage, Member of the European Parliament on November 28, at a press conference in Brussels, Professor Gilles Eric Séralini of the University Caen will defend his sensational article on GMOs, released last year, which is now threatened with retraction.
Seralini asked to retract his article on a GMO maize. He refuses
Rachel Mulot
Le Nouvel Observateur (Science and the Future), 28 Nov 2013
GMWatch translation from French original at bit.ly/1jNbePu
He suggested that rats fed over a lifetime with GM maize NK603, tolerant to the herbicide Roundup and manufactured by the US company Monsanto, developed more tumors and diseases… The media coverage of the paper in September 2012 had caused turmoil amongst the public and politicians, a debate in the scientific community and a critical questioning of the safety evaluation procedures for genetically modified plants currently in force.
Bombard the Journal Editor – Support Seralini !!:
www.journals.elsevier.com/food-and-chemical-toxicology/editorial-board/a-wallace-hayes/#contact
No fraud or manipulation of data
Some days ago, the editor of the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology (Elsevier Group) which originally published the article, requested Professor Seralini to kindly retract it, that is to say to withdraw it himself.
The reason? “The results are inconclusive and therefore do not reach the threshold needed for publication” and “there is a legitimate reason for concern about both the number of animals tested in each group and the particular strain of rat selected,” he explains in a letter to the researcher at the University of Caen which Science and the Future has seen.
“MERIT”. The editor of FCT admits that “the problem of the low number of animals had been identified during the initial peer-review process” but it was finally decided to publish it because the work “still had merit despite its limitations”. It seems that the editorial policy of the magazine has changed (see here).
Praising the “goodwill and openness” of Gilles Eric Séralini, who provided the raw data to meet the criticisms raised by the article, the editor emphasises that finally, after having carefully and extensively studied it, the reviewers have detected “no fraud or manipulation of data”.
Refusal to comply and counter-attack
Professor Seralini now refuses to retract his article. He has argued for months that the offending strain of rat (the Sprague-Dawley) is used routinely in the United States – including sometimes by Monsanto to study the carcinogenicity and chronic toxicity of chemicals. He recalls that he has conducted a groundbreaking study on rats fed over a lifetime with this GM maize and even if he only used ten rats per group, he has nevertheless performed many more measurements on these animals.
“The disruption of sex hormones and other parameters are sufficient in this case to indicate a serious effect after a year,” he protested, demanding that we take into account “the timing and number of tumors per animal”.
DOUBLE STANDARD? There are many signs that should be considered in a real study of risk, he said. In addition, the researcher points to a paper by Monsanto, published in 2004 in the same journal FCT and never retracted, finding NK603 maize safe after measuring its effects on ten Sprague-Dawley rats for three months only, and asks: is there a double standard in force for assessment?
“Only studies pointing to adverse effects of GMOs are rigorously scrutinized on their experimental and statistical methods,” he said, “while those who say GMOs are safe are taken at face value.”
Latest bombshell: the biologist is preparing to challenge the way statistical analyses are performed on tested rats because they are distorted by historical data. According to a study that he aims to carry out with his team, all experimental animals have always been exposed in their cages and via their food to pollutants (pesticides, mercury, cadmium, endocrine disrupting chemicals) and possibly GMOs … so that it was impossible to distinguish spontaneous, natural, tumors from tumours induced by these substances, regardless of the number of rats tested …
Fan the flames: To conduct tests on large cohorts of 50 rats per group, for example, would therefore be pointless. In short, the ultimate defence [of Seralini’s 2012 GM maize study] is to cast doubt on the relevance of the studies done so far. This statement – which would need to be seriously supported – will undoubtedly cause a wave of protest. The editors of the journal Food and Chemical Toxicology were perhaps hoping to extinguish the controversy, but instead they may have fanned the flames.
(2 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
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Science is all about fact finding. When the facts do not agree with the monied corporate policy- too bad. It is widely known that there have been no long term studies about GMO/pesticide use and human health. I, for one, am happy to know that there is independent research being done. Prof. Seralini, please don’t cave in.
It is as if the GMO cartels wish us to shift our attention away from a certain well-known UC Davis GMO advocate –the “public face” of GMOs, as it were– who actually HAS retracted two articles recently.
The recent demand on the part of the journal, Food and Chemical Toxicology (FCT) is a most interesting one, and should be closely followed all over the world.
If any political or corporate influence has directly or indirectly pressured the FCT to demand a retraction from M. Seralini, the world needs to know.
As for me, I am quite sure that we are now witnessing the decline of American science, American technology, American education, American scholarship, and much else that has made our country so great.
Moreover, I am of the belief that America’s deadly (and long obsolete) agricultural practices are greatly contributing to our country’s rapid decline. Poisoning the America People with pesticides, herbicides, toxic food, fluoride, GMOs and much else will obviously not ensure our continued success as a nation.
Our continuation as humans is at stake, as well. Livestock are already suffering the consequences of GMO feed. Poor development and failing reproduction rates.
There are still some heroes left in this world, a world where so many have weaker individuals can be bought out and paid for. I am a concerned mom who has been forced–by sheer concern–to do a lot of research on the subject of GMOs. I am also very familiar with Monsanto–the giant among Biotech multinationals–and I understand how they position their employees in departments of great influence and regulatory agencies, throughout North America. I understand the end goal. And so do millions and millions of other people worldwide. Dr. Seralini, you may not realize how many of us “have your back”. We appreciate your integrity and professional standards. You have a soul, and you have pride in your work. You have professional ethics. And you are not alone in this fight. Dr. Seralini, I do not know if you will ever see this message, but I hope that you do. There is an army of support behind you in North America. And we are here to stay. We are waiting to hear more from you. I think the FCT has just destroyed itself. Anything they publish now is obsolete to anyone who has any idea of what is really going on… in the real world, that is.
Well said.
Very well said.
We are behind him…all the way!!
Thank you Prof. Seralini, for being a candle in the darkness.
It is evident that Prof. Seralini is a threat to Monsanto – and by extension to the US government.
Thank you Prof. Seralini.
a message from scientist Arpad Pusztai
“When all scientists who dare to live up to their noble profession’s highest standards & tell the truth have been eliminated … it will be too late to act.”
gmfreescotland.blogspot.com/2011/01/special-message-from-dr-pusztai.html
I appreciate Professor Seralini’s integrity and determination in this matter. He has conducted his interactions with honor and tact. There are so many standing with you in this fight! I truly admire your bravery and purpose in the battle to expose the hazards of GMOs!
My Uncle in-law Died 3 months after a pancreatic cancer diagnosis. He spent 2 years in Laos and Cambodia at the height of Agent Orange use. Now he and everyone we knew who were his friends while in-country have died from a rare malignancy of the pancreas, thyroid, lymphatic system and others. How many more will suffer for others profit?
What about the young rats purchased by scientists for a study? What were the young rats and their parents fed? This is similar to my situation when searching for uncontaminated animal products, whether meat, fish, eggs, or butter oil, domesticated or wild. Closed herds, where the farmer or rancher raises all replacement animals from within the existing herd or flock, not buying replacement animals from the “open” & therefore probably contaminated market, are few in number. I imagine finding uncontaminated lab rats of a particular strain is much more difficult.
Mon-SATAN needs to be exposed.
Yeah they want him to retract it because they don’t want the public to know how dangerous GMO foods are. Wellllll…….TOO LATE!!!
Exactly! It is TOO LATE; WE ALREADY KNOW THE DANGERS OF GMO. They just make themselves look suspiciously stupid and guilty by trying a stunt like this. It is actually a good thing that they did it, because it raises awareness. People that might not have heard of GMO otherwise, might now question it.
The Seralini study must continue. Do not retract. We believe in you.
Here’s to the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes… the ones who see things differently — they’re not fond of rules… You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can’t do is ignore them because they change things… they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do.-Steve Jobs
Seralini and Team, we see your genius, courage, hard work and dedication. Thank you for doing this study and standing by it!
To the point about the rats being predisposistioned for tumors…if this is so, what about the human being who are predisposition for tumors ( ie: breast cancer) wouldn’t this then study be of particular value to them? There are far too many families where the sister, daughter and mother all have breast cancer. Please keep up your trail blazing work. And Thank you from Moms Across America.
Here is what Dr E Ann Clark had to say about the retraction of papers:
www.gmwatch.org/index.php/news/archive/2013/15192-orwellian-airbrushing-of-scientific-record
tl;dr: the research adheres to scientific standards and the retraction is unprecedented.
Please stand strong Dr. Seralini and team …. we need more people just like YOU watching out for our world!
The vast majority of people still fall for the pro-gmo line “everything is genetically modified”. The easiest was I’ve found to get them thinking about it is to tell them “every time you eat roundup-ready food you are poisoning your gut bacteria with roundup”. If they say that they want more proof I give them the link to the paper by Dr. Samsel & Dr. Seneff:
Anthony Samsel and Stephanie Seneff, “Glyphosate’s Suppression of Cytochrome P450 Enzymes and Amino Acid Biosynthesis by the Gut Microbiome: Pathways to Modern Diseases” Entropy 2013, 15(4), 1416-1463; doi:10.3390/e15041416
The PDF is available free on Dr Seneff’s home page:
people.csail.mit.edu/seneff/
Thanks Professor Seralini for your research and for keeping your integrity.
It’s Poison just as EVERY SINGLE THING Monsanto has ever made. Dow Chemical makes crap they use on “medicine/poisons” too. So they will kill coming or going. We need to BAN ALL GMO toxic waste in EVERY country. No one to sell to they will quit making it. Check your ingredients. No matter what country you live in, if it contains, Soy, Corn, Canola, Beets, Safflower, or cottonseed oil, DO NOT BUY IT, DO NOT EAT IT! Live healthy avoid GMO.
Thank you, Dr. Seralini, for your courage in publishing your scientific study. Especially in light of the vile treatment meted out to Dr. Arpad Pusztai following his scientific testing of GMO potatoes.