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America’s foremost nutritional problem may well be the sheer quantity of food it consumes, but the nation is increasingly haunted by a much more arcane question about its diet: Did someone at some point tinker with its DNA?
The anti-GMO movement has a superficially appealing argument: even if the dangers of genetic modification are an article of faith rather than fact, why not disclose it and let the people decide?
The trouble is that unlike the rest of the information the federal government requires labels to include, genetic modification is not an ingredient or a nutrient, but a technology – a means rather than an end.
Requiring food makers to tell us whether the corn they used was genetically manipulated is like forcing them to disclose whether it was cultivated in the presence of a scarecrow. It has no demonstrable relationship to anyone’s health.
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And no one, by the way, is or should be preventing voluntary labeling of foods as GMO-free. Indeed, with corporations such as Whole Foods and Chipotle pandering to unfounded anxieties, anyone who is determined to avoid genetically modified foods should have no trouble doing so.
But government-mandated labeling would wrongly elevate the issue by suggesting that genetic modification has proven health implications. That’s why the Senate should join the House in acting to head off such labeling requirements.
There is no shortage of work left to do on scientifically sound labeling. Consider how much prepared food is sold and served without a calorie count attached – a fact with unimpeachable relevance to a nation of overeaters. Governments and corporations intent on improving public health should focus on providing useful information instead of legitimizing misinformation.
Read full, original post: GMO panic is bad policy
