1.Billions of genetically modified bugs will spread in fruit and veg under new EU proposals 
2.Releasing millions of GM mosquitoes – into the unknown
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1.Billions of genetically modified bugs will spread in fruit and veg under new EU proposals
GeneWatch, 23 August 2012
http://www.genewatch.org/article.shtml?als[cid]=569457&als[itemid]=571100

GeneWatch UK today slammed the EU's new draft rules for approving genetically modified (GM) insects, fish, farm animals and pets (1). The organisation warned that billions of GM insect eggs and caterpillars would be left in vegetables and fruit if UK company Oxitec's GM moths and flies are approved by the EU under the new rules. Oxitec's GM insects have been genetically engineered so their caterpillars die inside olives or tomatoes or on the leaves of cabbages (2). The company plans to release GM pests across the EU to mate with wild pests in an attempt to reduce their numbers. Millions of GM pests must be released each week to have any effect on wild populations.

The draft guidance, published for consultation by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) specifically excludes testing whether GM insects and caterpillars are safe to eat.

"No one will want to eat dead or dying GM caterpillars in their olives or tomatoes" said Dr Helen Wallace "And no one knows whether the GM pests that are still alive will end up in their garden or a local farmer's fields. What EFSA is proposing is a massive gamble with our food supplies and the environment."

GeneWatch UK has written to the EU Commission objecting to the roles of Oxitec and multinational pesticide company Syngenta in drafting the new rules and questioning EFSA's competence to draft guidance on issues that are not within its remit (3). Syngenta has funded Oxitec to develop GM agricultural pests and most of Oxitec's management and Board are ex-Syngenta staff. In its response to the consultation, GeneWatch has highlighted how the companies have distorted the draft guidance to favour approval of GM insects for commercial use.

"Companies that hope to profit from gambling with people's health and the environment are writing their own rules" said Dr Wallace, "What is the point of a food safety authority that will not do its job?"

GeneWatch's concerns about the draft guidance include:

EFSA claims that health risks of GM bugs in food were addressed by a previous consultation which in fact explicitly excluded them;
EFSA does not explain how GM fish or insect eggs could be prevented from ending up in the wrong places and causing harm to the environment;
EFSA has tried to change its remit to include industry claimed "benefits" (reduced use of pesticides): this is not part of EFSA's role under EU legislation;
Nature will adapt to GM insect releases in complex ways that have been ignored e.g. reducing one pest using Oxitec's approach could make another pest problem worse;
Impacts of GM insects on human and animal diseases are poorly understood and have not been properly considered;
EFSA has ignored: (i) the risks of releasing more than one type of GM insect in the same area; and (ii) Oxitec's plans to combine GM pests with GM crops as a way to try to slow the growing resistance of GM pests to GM pest-resistant crops (Bt crops);
The release of GM fish could harm wild fish and the environment;
Animal welfare concerns about spontaneously aborted, deformed and stillborn GM farm animals and pets continue to be ignored in favour of commercialising these GM animals.

For further information contact:

Dr Helen Wallace: 01298-24300 (office); 07903-311584 (mobile).

Notes for Editors:

(1)    GeneWatch UK response to EFSA's consultation on environmental risk assessment of GM animals. August 2012. On: http://www.genewatch.org/uploads/f03c6d66a9b354535738483c1c3d49e4/EFSA_GWresponse.pdf

(2)    For example, Oxitec's recent scientific paper "Control of the olive fruit fly using genetics-enhanced sterile insect technique" ( available on: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1741-7007/10/51/ ) reports that most of the female offspring of its GM olive flies will die as pupae. This will normally be before the adult flies emerge from the olives in which the flies lay their eggs. In the paper, Oxitec proposes that this should be treated as an "adventitious presence" under EU law, meaning that the presence in food of any dead, dying or surviving insects would be treated as accidental and would not require regulation, traceability or labelling of the olives or other foods. Most of the offspring of Oxitec's GM insects die at the late larval (i.e. caterpillar) or pupal stage, but some will survive to adulthood. Oxitec is currently working on GM tomato borers, GM diamond back moths (which eat cabbages and broccoli) and GM fruit flies.

(3)    Open letter to EU Commission available on: http://www.genewatch.org/uploads/f03c6d66a9b354535738483c1c3d49e4/Dalli_letter_EFSA.pdf
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2.Releasing millions of GM mosquitoes – into the unknown
Helen Wallace 
Public Service Europe, 23 August 2012
http://www.publicserviceeurope.com/article/2358/releasing-millions-of-gm-mosquitoes-into-the-unknown

Millions of GM mosquitoes are being released into countries including Brazil in an attempt to tackle dengue fever, but one campaigner questions whether the experiments are driven by public health concerns or profit

British biotech company Oxitec has released genetically modified mosquitoes in large numbers in the Cayman Islands – three million and Brazil – 10 million as well as a smaller number in Malaysia – 6,000. These actions are part of experiments to reduce the incidence of the tropical disease dengue fever. They are the first open experiments involving GM insects anywhere in the world. How well have the risks been assessed?

Risk assessments were not published prior to the releases of GM mosquitoes in Cayman or Brazil and only Malaysia had any kind of consultation process. Failure to publish risk assessments can lead to poor quality assessments and people cannot give informed consent to trials, if they are not given complete information. The company has repeatedly referred to its GM mosquitoes as sterile, when this so-called sterility is partial and conditional – it is dependent on the absence of the antibiotic tetracycline, which is used to breed the GM insects in the lab. The male GM mosquitoes breed with wild female mosquitoes and most of the offspring die as larvae: the extent to which some offspring survive to adulthood is one of many factors which influences the efficacy and safety of the firm's approach.

We at GeneWatch UK have recently published an investigation based on an analysis of the risk assessments, obtained using Freedom of Information requests in the United Kingdom. Our new briefing highlights numerous errors and omissions in the risk assessment process for GM mosquitoes. The process did not correctly follow the regulatory procedure for notifying shipments of its GM mosquito eggs overseas. The practical consequence of this is that risk assessments were not made publicly available prior to open release trials and might not meet the necessary standards. This means that most potential adverse impacts have effectively been excluded from public debate, the risk assessment process and the process of seeking consent from local populations.

Numerous important issues were not properly considered before millions of GM mosquitoes were released into the environment in the Cayman Islands and Brazil. Smaller experiments in Malaysia did include a consultation process. However there were some deficiencies with the process, which need to be addressed. Issues include: the possibility that another invasive mosquito species which carries dengue becomes established at release sites; the potential for large numbers of GM mosquitoes to survive and breed in sites contaminated with the antibiotic tetracycline; and loss of human immunity and cross-immunity, if the releases are only temporarily or partially effective in dengue-endemic areas.

The results of the experiments have been press released, but not published in scientific journals. Although information in the public domain suggests that the GM mosquitoes may not be particularly effective at suppressing wild mosquito populations. The effects on human immunity mean that ineffective measures can increase severe cases of the disease in dengue-endemic countries such as Brazil, putting people's health at unnecessary risk.

Further documents obtained through FoI requests show that the British and Brazilian governments agreed in 2007 to test and commercialise GM mosquitoes in Brazil – based on claims made by the company that its technology would be effective. A new production facility has now been built in Brazil to increase GM mosquito releases to 2.5 million per week. The decision to scale-up these experiments appears to be driven by this political agreement to commercialise the technology, rather than by a thorough assessment of the likely risks and benefits. The rush to marketise GM mosquitoes in Brazil means there has been no attempt to consider human immunity effects or to monitor the impacts on immune response or the incidence of dengue.

Dr Helen Wallace is director of the GeneWatch UK campaign group