GMO Plants - A Miracle or Hazard to Humans

I want to discus about GMOs but before I do so, I just feel the need to back in time to the 1840s and how it was for Irish people. In those years, there was hunger in the land, with poor people starving because they all depended on Potatoes and Tomatoes which was now being attacked by a fungi that was transferred easily through wind, making the impossible for the fruits from the crops to be edible. 1 in 6 people died of starvation, which led to people migrating from Ireland to other regions.

In the year 1881, the population of Ireland was down to about 4 million people. The country and world continued to suffer from Phytophthora infestans (Late Blight) and even till date, Late Blight is a 5 billion dollar problem for the Agriculture industry but then there was a breakthrough in 2015; A Genetically Modified Potato Breed called the Innate Potato was created which was able to resist the blight that killed the potatoes leading to millions of death and migration of people. When you would expect everyone to be happy about it, there is a problem Countries want to ban the GMO potatoes including the Ireland, and it isn't the potatoes alone, A lot of countries are still on the fence on whether to ban GMO crops.

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The debate on GMO is a continuous ones with hearing words like viruses an bacteria are being injected into the plants so it is not good for consumption, as it will give the world cancer, and you would hear others say that GMO crops is going to end world hunger. When you listen to these debates, you begin to find their scientific backings as regard to their claims, and you will realize that a lot of people are just reproducing infinite unscientific claims. Let me say this quick, GMOs aren't going to save the world, neither are they going to destroy the world. It isn't Black or white. That said, let's get into it as fast as possible.

Genetically Modified Organisms are organisms that have had their genes altered through genetic engineering methods. To create a genetically modified organism, the first thing to do is to identify the trait of interest, Isolate the trait, insert the trait into a desired organism, then breed or propagate the organism. Majority of the GMOs we have in our world now do one of these things which is to provide protection from pest (insect resistance) and disease, ability to grow in drought, and improve quality of the organism.

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An example of pest resistant crop is the genetically modified corn that was introduced in 1996 to farmers to help them improve production while preventing pest like corn borers, and beetles from eating the corn. To get this, protein derived from Bacillus Thuringiensis was introduced into the corn through transgenesis which prevents corn borers from eating the maize because its crystal protein are toxic to them. The gene insertion is done in plant using tissue culture of the Callus which is similar to stem cells in humans. The gene is inserted into the nucleus of the cell without killing the cell.

Okay, let's talk about GMO in rice for the betterment of humans. In rural areas, lack of vitamin A leads to infant blindness and this is because the staple food in the region is rice. To solve this, scientist decided to create golden rice which is a rice with vitamin A and with this, people from this area can eat their staple food and get the nutrition they need. The rice has beta-carotene which is the pigment in carrots and a precursor of vitamin A.

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We cannot determine that a food is completely best provided we are able to say it is safe and hazards have not occurred from consuming them. There have been over 500 scientific studies that haven't reached a conclusive result when it comes to GMO and Human Health risk. Before the foods are transferred to humans, they are tested against lab simulated gene proteins in the human gut or they test it on animal models like lab rats for a long time to see toxicity against the animal model.

There is certainly going to be two sides to a coin and this is the other side, some crops are herbicide resistant which means that they cannot be killed by certain herbicides like Glyphosate resistant soybeans. Farmers that use this strain of soybean has been seen to use more herbicides on their farm compared to farmers that do not use the soybean strain, and herbicide has been implicated in a possible cause of cancer.

Saying GMOs are harmful is similar to saying that technology is harmful completely. Instead of the complete fear and criticism of GMO plants, it will be better if we study them properly, and go against GMOs that cause health hazards or linked to health conditions. This said

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Reference

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^{https://www.irishcentral.com/news/genetically-engineered-potato-resist-great-hunger-blight
https://www.simplot.com/plant-sciences
https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/use-and-impact-of-bt-maize-46975413/
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.1600850
https://sci-hub.se/https://www.nature.com/articles/nbt.3133
https://www.thejournal.ie/readme/gmo-defence-plant-biotechnology-4186927-Aug2018/
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/science/ban-on-gm-crops-is-a-blight-on-irish-agriculture-1.3767996
https://www.science.org/content/article/activists-destroy-golden-rice-field-trial
https://www.thejournal.ie/readme/gmo-defence-plant-biotechnology-4186927-Aug2018/
https://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2015/good-as-gold-can-golden-rice-and-other-biofortified-crops-prevent-malnutrition/
https://enveurope.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s12302-016-0070-0
https://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2015/how-to-make-a-gmo/
https://www.npr.org/2019/05/13/723056453/california-jury-awards-2-billion-to-couple-in-roundup-weed-killer-cancer-trial
https://allianceforscience.org/blog/2018/11/anti-gmo-activism-sows-doubt-science/}