Health24 Blogs

 Dr Leon Van Eck is a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Genetics at Stellenbosch University. He writes this  guest post on the Genetically Modified food controversy. Read it and let us know what you think at the bottom.

Scientists are very good at explaining what it is they do—to other scientists. However, they are notoriously bad at explaining their research to the general public. Science is currently facing a PR crisis, as evidenced by polarizing media coverage of such topics as climate change, vaccinations, and genetically engineered crops.

Growing public mistrust of agricultural biotechnology is especially disconcerting. During Norman Borlaug’s Green Revolution of the 20th century, agronomists developed small-growing but high-yielding varieties of the world’s staple crops.

These advancements in crop science are widely celebrated for saving billions of people from starvation. But in the 21st century, we’ve shifted from public reverence for agricultural science to consumer rage and bewilderment in the produce aisle. How did we get here?

GE crops ‘no risk to human health’

In doing your own research on a topic like genetically modified organisms (GMOs), you’ll come across online articles to support almost any claim. Figuring out whether those claims are made with authority and are based on sound science can be tricky. Just because something uses a lot of jargon and sounds ‘sciencey’, it doesn’t necessarily mean it is proper science.

Genetically engineered (GE) crops are some of the most intensively tested food we’ve got. The overwhelming scientific consensus from many large-scale studies published in leading peer-reviewed scientific research journals says that GE food crops pose no additional risk to human health and do not have nutritional profiles different from those of conventional crops.

Entire nations of people have been eating them for a long time now, with absolutely no health problems that can be attributed to GE technology. Studies promoted by anti-GMO campaigners as supposed evidence of the harmful effects of consuming GMOs on our bodies are taken out of the context of the larger scientific consensus, and most often consist of dubious, inadequately reviewed research.

Dissidents insist on touting badly designed junk science studies, attempting to generate the perception that there is disagreement in the scientific community, when this is not the case. The media, in a misguided attempt at reporting with balance, tries to give equal weight to both sides of the story. However, just like the scientific consensus on the theory of gravity, there really is no other side to the story—there is only gravity.

With the recent rejection of California Proposition 37, labelling of food made from GE crops has gained more media coverage worldwide. Merely labelling a product “contains GMOs” makes it seem like a warning of some sort, and in fact does not allow a consumer to make an informed choice at all.  It’s simple scaremongering, and a wasted opportunity to educate. As a consumer, I might want to know that a product is made from a crop engineered to use less chemical fertiliser bad for the environment, or to require less pesticide that might be harmful to farm workers. Food labelling helps us all make informed decisions, and it’s how that labelling is done that makes the difference.

‘Better food’

We need to grow more and better food on less suitable land under increasingly variable climatic conditions. The best way to ensure future world food security is to combine biotechnology with sustainable agricultural practices.

Subsistence farmers, growing crops like cassava and sorghum, stand to gain the most as scientific research expands beyond industrial commodity crops like maize and soybeans. Current and future research efforts will focus on engineering traits of direct benefit to the end consumer, delivering more nutrients to those suffering from hidden hunger, such as Golden Rice, engineered to help alleviate vitamin A deficiency.

Because of scientific progress, we are living healthier, longer lives than ever before in the history of our species. So embrace the biotechnology in your basket, because scientific agriculture is the greatest tool for sustainable living on this planet into the 21st century and beyond.

Dr Van Eck is a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Genetics (Faculty of Agricultural Sciences) at Stellenbosch University. He recently won first prize in the prestigious 2013 Young Science Communicators Competition, administered by the South African Agency for Science and Technology Advancement.

Do you agree? Let us know, post a comment below or e-mail community@health24.com

Social media has been buzzing with this new advert from Dove. It’s all about how women see themselves versus how the rest of the world sees them. Watch it and let us know what you think below:

I’ve always wondered at people who just take ONE potato chip ever so politely when they’re offered. Who takes ONE potato chip, really?! Well not a lot of us, according to this new research which claims that the reason it’s so hard to stop eating those crunchy, salty chips is because they make our brains happy.

No I’m no science-boff but this does make sense in a strange way. It’s a fascinating article and highlights why we don’t really get the same pleasure from eating a bag of Brussel sprouts (shudder) as we do from these high-fat/high-carb junk foods. Even when we think we know better!

What foods can you not stop eating once you’ve started? E-mail us at community@health24.com

Have a super-duper weekend and remember not to pop those chips if you know you won’t be able to stop!

What happens when a hero is no longer heroic? Health24 guest blogger Cheryl Ramurath writes a very interesting piece:

Everybody wants a hero.

Not too many volunteer to be one.

Let’s face it: a true hero is fictional. They come alive on 3D screens and dominate the focus of media coverage. But deep down, we all know the deal. Someone is about to fall.

It’s a familiar story… someone becomes an overnight success – whether in business, sport, entertainment, etc… and they have more than ten minutes of fame where the world worships at their feet.

Until the moment that the stilts of man-made pedestals come tumbling down. Until the man or woman that has been glorified for super human feats is now shamed for the very humanity that lives in the hearts of their accusers.

Its become like a bad movie where one can tell the beginning from the end. Yet we keep watching because we hope that this time – there will be a different ending. We all fall into the trap. We want to believe. We want to hope that there is infallible goodness in man. That if he/she can take on superhero status, then maybe I too can achieve the impossible.

One day. When I finally get off the couch. Watching other people live the lives I wish I did. Secretly coveting and the seeming inhuman courage and strength exhibited by someone as normal as ourselves.

We relish in their triumphs, we cheer them on in their winning – but turn our heads in shame when they lose. When they disappoint us, when they hurt themselves, when they fail at the impossible task of being superhuman.

You would think we would all learn the lesson. You would think that we would begin to say: “Hey, people – there’s something wrong with this picture. This stuff doesn’t work.” But we chose to suspend our disbelief and believe in the lie once again.

Because its easier to make someone else accountable for what’s our responsibility. Its easier to say it’s the government and blame the past and anything and everyone else than it is to say: “It is up to me. What can I do to stop the madness?”

Individuals are not meant to taken on the weight of human expectation. We can’t all abscond from our duties to the collective soul of humanity and expect people to stand on their own, enduring pressure from all sides to be ‘perfect’.

We are meant to be led by others and to lead others. We are meant to be middle men between reality and possibility, between mediocrity and excellence, between despair and hope.

We have messed up the scales of equality. We are not less equal or more equal to others. We are all on the same plane in the eyes of God. Human. Part of a family that needs all parts to be pulling in the same direction, headed towards the same goal.

We can all be heroes if we make no one a hero. And when one falls, we all stretch out our hands to lift him/her up.

Visit Cheryl’s blog here.