The Gaia Reports

By Theodora Filis Babies could someday drink human-like milk derived from herds of genetically modified dairy cows, which scientists say could supplement breast milk and replace baby formula. Research, published in PLoS One, claims to be the first study to result in the production of a herd of cloned transgenic cattle expressing recombinant human lysozyme (rHLZ) in their milk. Lysozyme, a bactericidal protein that protects human infants from microbial infections, and is found in only trace amounts in cow milk. The researchers said that the new transgenic milk may allow for the transfer of the nutritional aspects of human lysozyme in human milk to bovine milk. “ Our study not only describes transgenic cattle whose milk offers similar nutritional benefits as human milk but also reports techniques that could be further refined for production of active human lysozyme on a large scale,” said the authors, led by Professor Ning Li, the China Agricultural University, China. Writing in the...

By Theodora Filis Monsanto, the multinational agricultural biotech giant, is also the world’s largest producer of genetically engineered seeds. Notorious for its aggressive and heavy-handed business tactics, and questionable ethics, Monsanto is deeply entrenched in our political system, having spent $2 million on lobbying in the first quarter of 2009. The policy Justice Thomas oversaw claimed that the agency was not aware of any information showing that GMO crops were no different in any meaningful or uniform way, and therefore didn’t need testing. However, 44,000 FDA internal documents made public from a lawsuit showed that this was a complete lie. The overwhelming consensus among the FDA’s own scientists was that GMO foods were quite different and could lead to unpredictable and hard-to-detect allergens, toxins, new diseases, and nutritional problems. They suggested long-term studies but were ignored. Last week, WikiLeaks released new diplomatic cables presenting more facts ...