June 30, 2016
Consumers must understand that attacks made against genetically engineered foods are dishonest manipulations and ignore decades of scientific research. So say more than 100 distinguished Nobel Prize laureates in an open letter.
The signers, largely specialists in medicine and chemistry, held a June 30 press conference in Washington, D.C. to publicize their collective position.
At the conference Richard Roberts, recipient of the 1993 Nobel Prize in medicine, said groups that claim genetically engineered foods are unsafe “have ignored the scientific evidence” developed over the past four decades. “The time has come when you know these things are safe,” Roberts added.
Randy Sheckman, a 2013 awardee in medicine, emphasized that the public must recognize how Greenpeace and other groups opposing such foods “prey on the fear of technological development.” Claims against these foods especially threaten the health and security of people living in developing nations, Schekman said.
The Nobel laureates’ letter calls upon all groups to end their opposition to all foods improved through biotechnology, especially genetically engineered rice that could reduce blindness caused by Vitamin A deficiency in children.
“Opposition based on emotion and dogma contradicted by data must stop,” the scientists wrote. They ended the letter with a warning: “How many poor people in the world must die before we consider this a ‘crime against humanity?’”
For a copy of the letter and a video of the press conference, visit http://supportprecisionagriculture.org/.