GeneWatch Warns of Superbug Danger from GMO Insect Factories

Sustainable Pulse | Feb 4, 2015

In a new report published today, GeneWatch UK publishes evidence that genetically modified (GM) insect factories could spread antibiotic resistant bacteria into the environment, posing a risk to human health (1). Antibiotic resistance is recognised to be a major problem for human and animal health as it makes treatments for many bacterial infections ineffective. Bacteria that are resistant to multiple antibiotics are sometimes known as “superbugs”.

UK company Oxitec has developed GM mosquitoes and agricultural pests which are bred using the common antibiotic tetracycline in their feed. The report explores concerns that mass-breeding and repeated large-scale open releases of such GM insects could spread antibiotic resistance into the environment, potentially creating more superbugs.

“Mass production of GM insects in factories, using antibiotics as an additive in their feed, could lead to drug resistance in bacteria, leading to the spread of superbugs as billions of insects are released into the environment in future” warned Dr Helen Wallace, GeneWatch UK’s Director, “This important risk to human health has been ignored by regulators, despite bans on the use of antibiotics in animal feed in many countries”.

Large-scale experimental releases of tens of millions of Oxitec’s GM mosquitoes are already taking place in Brazil and Panama, without considering this important risk, and releases are being considered in the Florida Keys. Oxitec’s GM fruit flies have been approved for release in Brazil, although these experiments have not yet taken place, and Oxitec is awaiting approval for experimental releases of GM diamondback moths in New York State. The company withdrew an application to release GM olive flies in Spain last year.

If commercial uses were to take place in the future, many billions of Oxitec’s GM insects would be released year after year in attempts to suppress wild pest insect populations over vast areas and perhaps whole countries. If such GM insects became a new source of antibiotic resistance worldwide, this could have serious adverse impacts on human and animal health.

The report highlights evidence that:

•           Exposure to antibiotics of the tetracycline class in feed during mass production is likely to lead to the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria in the GM insects’ guts;

•           Repeated releases of tens of millions of GM insects will disseminate these bacteria and their resistance genes widely in the environment;

•           In many insect species, bacteria and antibiotic resistance genes may spread through the insect population from the mainly male GM insects that are released to their wild mates and offspring;

•           Horizontal gene transfer may lead to transfer of antibiotic resistance to bacteria causing food- and water-borne diseases, such as E. coli, via larvae that develop in food (agricultural pests) or water (mosquitoes);

•           Direct routes of transfer to humans or animals include swallowing GM agricultural pests at the larval stage when they will contaminate fruit and vegetable supplies, swallowing GM mosquito larvae via contaminated water, or swallowing adult GM insects during mass releases, when they vastly outnumber the wild population;

•           Disposal of tetracycline-contaminated water from GM insect factories may also pose a risk and antibiotic resistance might also be transferred to workers in these factories;

•           The potential for antibiotic resistance to be transferred to other bacteria in the longer term via indirect routes, such as being spread by rodents eating GM larvae on crops to the bacteria carried by ticks which cause Lyme disease, needs further investigation, although horizontal gene transfer is much rarer in these species of bacteria;

•           Mass-breeding of GM insects using tetracycline breaches existing policies and regulations, which advise against indiscriminate feeding of antibiotics to animals worldwide and which ban this practice in some countries.

For further information contact:

Dr Helen Wallace: +44(0)-1298-24300 (office); +44(0)-7903-311584 (mobile)

Find the Full Report here: www.genewatch.org

Millions of GMO mosquitoes may be released in Florida neighborhood

Reuters / Ricardo Rojas

RT | Jan 26, 2015

Pointing to climate change and the rise of tropical diseases, British researchers hope to sell their idea of releasing millions of genetically modified mosquitoes in the Florida Keys. Almost 140,000 people have signed a petition against the plan.

For many years, the neighborhoods of the Florida Keys have been sprayed with insecticides to ward off a host of bugs, including perhaps the mother of all pests, the mosquito. Over time, however, Aedes aegypti, a mosquito that can spread the dengue fever, chikungunya, and yellow fever viruses has built up resistance to many of the insecticides used to kill them.

The rising risk of a mosquito infestation and disease outbreak presents an opportunity for one British firm, Oxitec, which has developed a method for breeding Aedes aegypti that kills mosquito larvae, AP reported.
According to Oxitec’s website, the process involves injecting a “lethal gene” into either the male sperm or female egg that eventually kills the offspring.

Change.org, the world’s largest petition platform, presented some of the unintended consequences of releasing millions of mutant mosquitos into the Florida Keys. For example, would the more virulent Asian tiger mosquito, which is also a carrier of dengue, “fill the void” left by a drop in Aedes aegypti populations? Or will the dengue virus mutate and become even more deadly?

@whatwakeup

The group calls efforts to introduce genetically modified mosquitos a “radical approach” since dengue fever has been absent from Key West since 2010. The group says this “indicates the current methods of control and public education are working.”

Oxitec says only non-biting male mosquitoes would be released, while attempting to assure the public that no genetically modified DNA would enter the bloodstream in the event of a bite from an overlooked female specimen.

Experts, however, question the claims.

"I think the science is fine, they definitely can kill mosquitoes, but the GMO issue still sticks as something of a thorny issue for the general public," Phil Lounibos, a researcher at the Florida Medical Entomology Laboratory, told AP.

"I'm on their side, in that consequences are highly unlikely. But to say that there's no genetically modified DNA that might get into a human, that's kind of a gray matter."

Oxitec spokeswoman Chris Creese said the experiment will be similar in size to one held in 2012 in the Cayman Islands, where 3.3 million genetically modified mosquitoes were set loose over a six- month period, resulting in the elimination of 96 percent of the targeted insects, AP quoted.

Critics say the British firm failed to notify residents about the possibility of being bitten by a few females overlooked by the researchers.

As more people question anything genetically modified, especially something that has the potential to suck their blood, resistance to the idea is growing. Already, almost 140,000 people have signed a Change.org petition to halt the experiment.

FDA spokeswoman Theresa Eisenman said no experiments with the modified bugs will be permitted until the agency has "thoroughly reviewed all the necessary information."

Marilyn Smith, a Florida Keys resident, wasn't sold on the plan following Oxitec's presentation at a public meeting. Smith asked "why are we being used as the experiment, the guinea pigs, just to see what happens," AP quoted her as saying.

Oxitec has a laboratory in Marathon, a Key West town of just over 10,000 people, and hopes to start releasing mosquitoes in the Key West region this spring.

Amazing Facts: Termites produce more CO2 each year than all living things combined

image

Ice Age Now | Dec 20, 2014

Termite and Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Facts:

Scientists have calculated that termites alone produce ten times as much carbon dioxide as all the fossil fuels burned in the whole world in a year.

Pound for pound, the weight of all the termites in the world is greater than the total weight of humans.

Scientists estimate that, worldwide, termites may release over 150 million tons of methane gas into the atmosphere annually. In our lower atmosphere this methane then reacts to form carbon dioxide and ozone.
It is estimated that for every human on Earth there may be 1000 pounds of termites.

On the average Termites expel gas composed of about 59% nitrogen, 21% hydrogen, 9% carbon dioxide, 7% methane, and 4% oxygen.

It is thought “There are 2,600 different species of termites, and it is estimated that there are at least a million billion individual termites on Earth, that they emit two and four percent of the global carbon dioxide and methane budget, respectively-both mediated directly or indirectly by their microbes.

http://termitedetector.com/detection.cfm

Thanks to E Stephens for this link

Blood-sucking ‘kissing bug’ has infected 300k Americans with deadly disease

Reuters / Tomas Bravo TB / JJ

RT | Nov 10, 2014

The United States is being infected by Chagas, a deadly disease spread by the feces of a parasite nicknamed the “kissing bug.” It bites sleeping victims, ingests the blood and defecates on them; patients then unknowingly rub the feces into open membranes.

Chagas disease is seen as a “silent killer” by those who study and treat it, as it can often lurk in people’s bloodstreams for up to two decades before causing their organs to fail. The initial stage of the tropical illness ‒ the acute phase ‒ is mostly symptom-free and lasts for the first few weeks or months, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. If a patient does exhibit symptoms, they can easily be mistaken for another disease.

The symptoms noted by the patient can include fever, fatigue, body aches, headache, rash, loss of appetite, diarrhea, and vomiting. The signs on physical examination can include mild enlargement of the liver or spleen, swollen glands, and local swelling (a chagoma) where the parasite entered the body, the CDC explained.

"People don't normally feel sick," Melissa Nolan Garcia, a research associate at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston and the lead author of two of three recently published studies, explained in a statement, "so they don't seek medical care, but it ultimately ends up causing heart disease in about 30 percent of those who are infected."

Read more..

First GMO Mosquitoes: Now Oxitec Wants to Release GMO Moths in New York

RINF | Oct 4, 2014

Will the crazy GMO-creations ever come to a halt? Are our crops not enough for biotech? GM mosquitoes developed by Oxitec, a UK company, were already released in other countries as a means to control disease. The company is also trying to release them in the Florida Keys, while working to release GM olive flies in Spain. But it gets even more bizarre – now Oxitec wants to release GM moths in New York.

GeneWatch UK has been following Oxitec’s moves and has noted that the company’s GM experiments have not undergone environmental assessment risks at all. The company is a spin off from a multinational seed company, with deep ties to Syngenta. Oxitech claims to be in the business of pest control, but another theory is that they are in the business with other eugenicists for pest creation.

Open release experiments using Oxitec’s GE Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are ongoing in Brazil and Panama. Though the GE mosquitoes being released in these experiments differ from Oxitec’s GE agricultural pests in that both sexes of the GE mosquitoes are genetically engineered to die at the late larval/pupal stage.

There is no guarantee that this type of genetic manipulation of the natural world would not result in serious ramifications up and down the food chain. For example, if one species of mosquitoes replaces another, more virulent breed of mosquitoes are likely to fill the void, possibly causing further crop damage, and even the spreading of viral disease in humans.

World's biggest aquatic insect claimed by China

'With its wingspan measured as 21 centimetres, the
insect won the title of the largest aquatic insect in the
world,' reported Ecns.cn, the official English-language
service of the state-run China News Service.
(Zhong Xin/China News Service)

CBC.ca | Jul 24, 2014

An insect with huge horn-like jaws and a wingspan similar to a sparrow's has been reported by Chinese media as a record-breaking find.

"With its wingspan measured as 21 centimetres, the insect won the title of the largest aquatic insect in the world," reported Ecns.cn, the official English-language service of the state-run China News Service.

The website posted photos of the insect, which was found in the mountains near Chengdu, in Sichuan province. One shows the insect's lacy, patterned dragonfly-like wings stretched far wider than the palm of the person holding it, and in another, a modest-looking chicken egg sits nearby for scale.

The website says the photos were taken on July 17 and that the insect belongs to the taxonomic group or order Megaloptera (a name that means large, folded wings). The group includes large insects called dobsonflies or fishflies, along with smaller alderflies.

While the insect is claimed as the largest "aquatic" insect, dobsonflies and alderflies only live in the water as a larvae or juvenile – adults live on land. On the other hand, they spend only a few days as adults. While the larvae are ferocious underwater predators, the adults either don't eat or sip only nectar and fruit juice.

The elephant beetle is one of many insects that are
likely far heavier than the new 'largest aquatic insect.'
(Udo Schmidt/Wikimedia Commons)

It also is nowhere near the biggest insect in the world in any dimension. According to the University of Florida Book of Insect Records, the record for biggest wingspan — 30 centimetres —  is held by the white witch moth; and several giant beetles and grasshopper-like creatures called giant wetas  — all of which are huge and have far stockier builds than the new dobsonfly — are the heaviest.

However, an insect quite similar, and not that much smaller than the new Chinese insect, lives right here in Canada. The Eastern dobsonfly Corydalus cornutus has a wing span of 14 centimetres and males have "sickle-shaped and tusk-like mandibles" that are about four centimetres long, according to entomologists Rob Cannings and Geoff Scudder of the Royal B.C. Museum.

"Such males have been seen to 'duel' with each other and to prod the female during courtship," the two wrote in a scientific article about the Megaloptera species in Canada.

Overall, there are 17 species of dobsonflies and alderflies in Canada.

The Eastern dobsonfly has a wingspan of up to 14 centimetres, and males have 'sickle-shaped and tusk-like mandibles.' While it can be found in Quebec, this specimen was collected in Ecuador. (Didier Descouens/Wikimedia Commons)

The Ten Plagues That Are Hitting America Right Now

End of the American Dream | Jul 23, 2014 | Michael Snyder

Why are so many plagues hitting the United States all of a sudden?  Yes, one can always point out bad stuff that is happening somewhere in the country, but right now we are facing a nightmarish combination of crippling drought, devastating wildfires, disastrous viruses, dying crops and superbugs that scientists don’t know how to kill.  And as you will see, we even have a plague of flies down in Mississippi.  So what in the world is going on?  Is this just a case of bad luck, or is something else happening?  At the conclusion of this article, please feel free to tell me what you think.  The following are ten plagues that are hitting America right now…

#1 The Plague Of Flies In The Upper Mississippi River Valley

This is perhaps the least dangerous plague, but it is also one of the most interesting.  Just recently, a plague of flies was so thick in the upper Mississippi River valley that it showed up on radar…

The mayflies were detectable on radar around 845 pm and reports in the towns and cities began rolling in of the swarming and piles of mayflies. Numerous videos and pictures were circulating on social media, some of which are posted below as well.

The radar detected the flies about 845 pm, emanating from the river (the source) with echo values similar to that of light-moderate rain (35-40 dBZ). With a general south-to-north wind flow above the surface, the mayflies quickly moved north once in the air. As the flies dispersed moving north-northeast, they also gained altitude with some of the echo being detected as far north as Black River Falls and as high as 2500 feet above ground.

By late evening, mayflies were swarming in La Crosse, La Crescent, Stoddard and points up and down the river. While the emergence of mayflies from their river bottom mud dwelling can occur at various times through the warm season depending on the species, this particular emergence was that of the larger black/brown Bilineata species.

Here is one photo of the flies that was posted by the federal government…

#2 The Chikungunya Virus

As I wrote about the other day, down in Florida health officials have discovered the very first confirmed cases of the chikungunya virus to be transmitted locally.  In other words, it is now being passed to people that have not even traveled out of the country.

An epidemic of the virus has already been declared down in Puerto Rico, and authorities are deeply concerned about the possibility of one up here as well.

Already, cases of the virus have been reported in 30 different states and the total number of cases in the U.S. is more than five times higher than in any other recent year.

If you live in an area that has a lot of mosquitos, you might want to be very, very careful right about now because this is a virus that is exceedingly painful…

With illness onset, the person develops high fever, chills, and joint pain, followed in some by a rash on the trunk, limbs and face lasting 3-4 days. Muscle and joint pain last about one week. Joint pain is often severe and in some people lasts longer, up to several months.

#3 The Wildfires Out West

The massive wildfires in Washington, Oregon and western Canada have spread clouds of smoke over vast areas of the northwest United States in recent days.  The following excerpt comes from a recent CNN report…

Wildfires spanning almost 170,000 acres are driving hundreds of people from their homes in Washington state and across the border in Canada, officials said.

Washington authorities say the fires surged overnight to 168,713 acres in the state. The flames have encroached on towns.

Janet Pearce of the Washington state Department of Natural Resources said the four fires had not been contained as of Friday morning. An estimated 80 homes were destroyed and cell phone service was knocked out.

#4 The Drought In California

The nightmarish multi-year drought in the state of California just continues to get even worse.

This week it was reported that 81 percent of California is now experiencing “extreme drought” or worse.
Three months ago, that number was just 68 percent.

And we are being told that downtown Los Angeles is now the driest that it has been since rain records began in 1877.

For much, much more on this, please see my recent article entitled “20 Signs The Epic Drought In The Western United States Is Starting To Become Apocalyptic“.

#5 The Virus That Has Killed Millions Of Our Pigs

A horrific pig virus known as porcine epidemic diarrhea came over from China a little over a year ago.

Since then, it has killed about 7 million pigs, and approximately 100,000 more are dying each week.

#6 Citrus Greening

Have you ever heard of citrus greening disease?

Perhaps not, but it has gotten so bad down in Florida that experts are now saying that the entire citrus industry in the state “could be destroyed”…

“It’s horrible — it’s a disaster,” says Fred Gmitter, a professor of horticulture science at the University of Florida Citrus Research and Education Center.

It might be time to kiss your OJ goodbye, unless science steps in to save the day.
At least 70% of Florida’s citrus trees are already infected by the disease, known as citrus greening, huanglongbing, or occasionally just with an ominous “it,” as in “It’s here.”

Florida’s citrus crop this year is the lowest it’s been in 30 years, and agricultural authorities have continued to lower their production estimates. Orange-juice prices are up nearly 20% this year alone and will continue to rise. The disease was a major factor in the lime shortage that made the price of a box of Persian limes jump from $18 to $85 last December. Prices could jump higher for oranges. Researchers and growers say that if a cure isn’t found, the entire $9 billion Florida citrus industry could be destroyed.

#7 Bananas Going Extinct?


You bananas are not safe either.

According to CNBC, the TR4 fungus is spreading so rapidly that it could eventually totally wipe out the variety of bananas that we find in our grocery stores today…

Banana lovers take note: The world’s supply of the fruit is under attack from a fungus strain that could wipe out the popular variety that Americans eat.

“It’s a very serious situation,” said Randy Ploetz, a professor of plant pathology at the University of Florida who in 1989 originally discovered a strain of Panama disease, called TR4, that may be growing into a serious threat to U.S. supplies of the fruit and Latin American producers.

“There’s nothing at this point that really keeps the fungus from spreading,” he said in an interview with CNBC.

While there are nearly 1,000 varieties of bananas, the most popular is the Cavendish, which accounts for 45 percent of the fruit’s global crop—and the one Americans mostly find in their supermarkets.

#8 The Number Of Earthquakes Is Increasing

For a long time, scientists tried to deny that the number of earthquakes is increasing.

But now, the USGS is finally admitting that the number of big earthquakes has doubled…

If you think there have been more earthquakes than usual this year, you’re right. A new study finds there were more than twice as many big earthquakes in the first quarter of 2014 as compared with the average since 1979.

“We have recently experienced a period that has had one of the highest rates of great earthquakes ever recorded,” said lead study author Tom Parsons, a research geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in Menlo Park, California.

Fortunately, most of the earthquakes in the U.S. so far this year have been relatively small or have been in isolated areas.

But they have been popping up in very unusual areas (such as Oklahoma), and as seismic activity along the Ring of Fire continues to increase, it is probably only a matter of time before one of our major cities gets hit with a major tragedy.

#9 Superbugs

Thanks at least in part to the massive overuse of antibiotics, a new generation of superbugs is arising.  Scientists have no way to kill these superbugs, and according to experts they are finding their way “into healthcare facilities nationwide”…

Drug-resistant superbug infections have reached near-epidemic levels across U.S. hospitals, with an alarming 500% increase now documented in a study just published in the August issue of Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology (the journal of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America).

Lead author of the study, Dr. Joshua Thaden, warned “This dangerous bacteria is finding its way into healthcare facilities nationwide… A CRE epidemic is fast approaching… Even this marked increase likely underestimates the true scope of the problem given variations in hospital surveillance practices.”

The study also found that an astonishing 94 percent of CRE infections were caused by healthcare activities or hospital procedures.

#10 Fukushima

The Fukushima nuclear disaster is the gift that just keeps on giving.

Hundreds of tons of radioactive water are being released into the Pacific on a continual basis, and this could potentially affect our oceans and our food chain for generations to come.

But it is a “slow motion disaster” that is already “old news”, so most Americans don’t think about it anymore.  But the truth is that there is a lot of evidence that it should be taken very seriously in this country.  For much more on this, please see this article.

In Japan, of course, things are even worse.

In fact, one Japanese doctor that was working in Tokyo says that radiation sickness is rampant in that city…

Since December 2011, I have conducted thyroid ultrasound examinations, thyroid function tests, general blood tests and biochemical tests on about 2000 people, mostly families in the Tokyo metropolitan area expressing concerns on the effects of radiation. I have observed that white blood cells, especially neutrophils, are decreasing among children under the age of 10. There are cases of significant decline in the number of neutrophils in 0-1 year-olds born after the earthquake (<1000). In both cases, conditions tend to improve by moving to Western Japan (Neutrophils 0–>4500). Patients report nosebleed, hair loss, lack of energy, subcutaneous bleeding, visible urinary hemorrhage, skin inflammations, coughs and various other non-specific symptoms.

And this Japanese doctor believes that things are so dire that he says that the entire city of Tokyo should be evacuated…

Residents of Tokyo are unfortunately not in the position to pity the affected regions of Tohoku because they are victims themselves. Time is running short. I took an earlier step forward and evacuated to the west. My fellow doctors of medicine, I am waiting for you here. And to the people in Eastern Japan still hesitating, all my support goes to facilitating and enabling your evacuation, relocation, or a temporary relief in Western Japan.

Just like with Chernobyl, this radioactive material is going to silently make people sick and kill people all over globe for years to come, and most of them will never have any idea what is really happening to them.

So what do you think about all of this?

Please feel free to share your thoughts by posting a comment below…

Beetles, Welcomed in Arizona to Help Save Water, May Also Wreak Environmental Havoc

Tamarisk beetle
(photo: Glen Canyon,
National Park Service)

ALLGOV | Jul 17, 2014 | Noel Brinkerhoff, Steve Straehley

The tamarisk beetle has been both a blessing and a curse in the American Southwest.

The agricultural industry and state water officials in Arizona have welcomed the insect because of its appetite for the tamarisk tree, a non-native species that critics say uses too much water, up to 200 gallons a day.

The trees, also known as salt cedars, have sprung up along the Colorado River in Arizona. Tamarisks, which are native to Asia and the Middle East, were imported years ago to stem erosion. With Lake Mead, the source of water for most of Arizona, at its lowest point since its construction, authorities are looking for a way to get more water flowing downstream and taking out the thirsty tamarisk looks like a good way to do it.

So man is putting another species into the ecosystem. The tamarisk beetle was introduced in Colorado about 10 years ago and has worked its way down to Northern Arizona. It’s starting to do its work there, eating tamarisk leaves and leaving dead trees in its wake.

But ecologists argue the beetles’ introduction will only cause other problems, demonstrating the complicated efforts by man to correct his interference with nature.

“We view the tamarisk as a pest,” Joseph Sigg, government relations director at the Arizona Farm Bureau, told The New York Times. “Water is an expensive input, and to the extent that we can lower it, the beetle can help.”

But the problem has not been solved, according to scientists who point out tamarisks or other trees will replace those fallen. In the meantime, bird species will be hurt by the tree losses, while the beetles will just go on eating whatever they can find.

“It’s one of the paradoxes of the tamarisk: There are worse alternatives,” Kelly Burke, executive director of the Grand Canyon Wildlands Council, told the newspaper. “Usually at the core of it is a simplistic equation that public officials and community leaders get in their head.”

Brazil Announces Dengue Fever Emergency in GMO Mosquito Trial Areas

Natural Society | Jul 9, 2014 | Christina Sarich

Natural Society reported back in February that a UK company was planning to release GMO mosquitoes in Panama in order to reduce the populations of dengue fever, but now civil society groups in a town in Brazil where GMO trial mosquitoes were released are expressing alarm at an increase in dengue incidence, leading them to declare an emergency decree.

Brazilians were promised that the GM mosquitoes would end dengue fever, but results from field trials conducted in Bahia, Brazil were never published and did not evaluate the relation between Aedes aegypti mosquito populations and the occurrence of dengue.  According to a Cambridge University study:

“. . . the targeted mosquitoes may simply move to another area and/or a different species of mosquito (Aedes albopictus) which also transmits dengue can move into the area. Complex immune responses to the four types of dengue virus mean that a partial reduction in mosquito numbers can reduce cross-immunity to the different serotypes and increase the number of cases of the severe form of the disease, Dengue Haemorrhagic Fever, which is more likely to be fatal.”

Without adequate scientific inquiry, the Brazilian regulator Comissão Técnica Nacional de Biossegurança (CTNBio) recently gave the green light to the commercialization of the technology proposed by Moscamed Brazil in partnership with the English company Oxitec and the Universidade de São Paulo. This is the same company that proposed releasing GM mosquitoes in Panama, for supposed similar reasons.

While it is understandable that municipalities with high dengue sickness rates would be interested in lessening the disease, it seems that biotech has once again fooled government agencies into polluting the environment with untested, unsafe, genetically manipulated organisms.

Once again, government officials ignored warnings that GM mosquitoes might be hazardous to public health. During the evaluation of the commercial application for the release of the GM mosquito, The National Technical Commission for Biosecurity (CTNBio) member had presented a report with information questioning the impact of the GM mosquitoes on the incidence of dengue, warning that in some circumstances the releases could make the disease worse, even if the number of wild Aedes aegypti mosquitoes was reduced. CTNBio approved Oxitec’s dengue ‘solution,’ nevertheless.

The Brazilian press even lauded the new weapon to combat dengue, but failed to print information that Jacobina’s mayor, a locality where the GMO mosquito trials took place, issued a decree in February 2014 renewing the state of emergency “due to the abnormal situation characterized as a biological disaster of dengue epidemic.”

Previously, Moscamed had announced an 81% and a 100% reduction in the number of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes in at least two localities of Jacobina, claiming that this meant the experiments were a success. According to Oxitec, pilot-scale releases started in the north-west of Jacobina in June 2013 and the programe would roll out across the entire city over two or three years.

The latest state of dengue emergency can be linked to the GMO mosquitoes, since the instance of disease is greatest in areas where they were released. The Brazilian National Agency of Sanitary Vigilance (ANVISA) is now in charge of registering and monitoring the product. Over 10 million GM mosquitoes are suggested for release for every 50 thousand inhabitants by the makers of the latest GM atrocity.

Horrific, Mosquito-Borne Virus Invades U.S. for the First Time

Photo Credit: Anest / Shutterstock.com

Alternet.org | Jul 5, 2014 | Lindsay Abrams

A combination of factors, including climate change, could soon make chikungunya a household name.

Heard of chikungunya? Up until a year ago , you may not have had reason to, as the mosquito-borne virus was confined to Asia and Africa. But the disease is now  making its way to the U.S., and with the right combination of factors could soon become a household name.

Transmitted by mosquito bites, chikungunya usually isn’t fatal,  according to the CDC, but symptoms, which include joint pain, can be “severe and disabling” — and can last for months. The name chikungunya, in fact, comes from a Makonde word meaning “that which bends up,” because “patients often are stooped in pain while suffering from the disease.” There’s no vaccine or treatment, and people in the Americas, not having been exposed to it before, have not developed any resistance to it.

Chikungunya first showed up in the Western Hemisphere last year, with cases  reported in the St. Martin. Since then, it’s  sickened over a quarter million people in the Caribbean. And so far, travelers in the region have brought  112 cases back to 27 U.S. states. Each time that happens, the CDC warns, the virus gets the opportunity to gain a foothold — and to start spreading locally.

“Right now, we are worried about chikungunya in the U.S.,” Roger Nasci of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,  told NPR. “In fact, we expect that over the course of the next months or years — as this virus spreads through the American tropics, and we see more travelers coming into the U.S — we will see local transmission.”

Compounding the problem is the propagation of the mosquito that carries and spreads the disease. The Asian tiger mosquito itself didn’t arrive in the U.S. until  1985, when it hitched a ride to Texas. Since then, it’s been making its way north. Its only limit is temperature, and right now, its boundary cuts off around New York City. But it only takes a little bit of warming, researchers have  found, to create the conditions needed for the mosquito to propagate. And as the U.S. warms, its range will likely expand even further northward.

An expansion of the mosquito’s range, right when chikungunya begins to arrive? It could make for a dreadful combination, three Yale University professors are warning. “How events like the chikungunya epidemic and the mosquito’s adaptation to climate change will play out is not clear,” they  write, “but it is in our best interest to learn quickly.” They add, in a column for CNN: “Pieces are falling into place for a historic epidemic on U.S. shores.”

Lindsay Abrams is an assistant editor at Salon and a former writer and producer for The Atlantic's Health Channel.

For Bigger, Better Crop Yields - We Need More Varieties of Bees

Activist Post | May 12, 2014 | Heather Callaghan

According to a new study, the secret to bounty is the bees...

What will ultimately feed the world? Is it genetic modification? Is it biodiversity?

Well, what can maintain and make that diversity - even your own garden - flourish? I mean, really overflow with bountiful food using less land?

Dr. Hannah Burrack, an associate professor of entomology at NC State and co-author of a paper on the research said:

We wanted to understand the functional role of diversity - And we found that there is a quantifiable benefit of having a lot of different types of bees pollinating a crop.

The researchers looked at blueberries in North Carolina because it is an economically important and well-understood crop that relies on insect pollination. Typical pollination might do the trick, but can we do more?

New research from North Carolina State University demonstrated that blueberries produced more seeds and larger berries if they were visited by more diverse bee species. Amazingly, this allowed farmers to harvest significantly more pounds of fruit per acre. And for each bee group introduced, the yield growth and profit appeared to be exponential.

 First, the researchers zeroed in on the five different bee species in the regional blueberry fields: honey bees, bumble bees, southeastern blueberry bees, carpenter bees and a functionally similar collection of species that they termed small native bees.

They even tested a mathematical algorithm that found an increase of $311 worth of yield per acre for each additional new species of bee pollinating. Example: one group would be typical yield, if two bee groups pollinated the field it would boost the yield by $311 per acre; for three bee groups, the boost becomes $622 per acre and so on!

So what is the sum value of each bee group to North Carolina blueberries?

Burrack says:

For North Carolina blueberries as a whole, we calculate the benefit of each group to be approximately $1.42 million worth of yield each year.

Holy blueberries, Batman! Holy bees, more like it.

Colleague and co-author Dr. David Tarpy said:

We think the benefit stems from differences in behavior between bee groups, in part depending on the weather.

Different bees for different weather - very important for our crazy weather patterns recently.

For example, southeastern blueberry bees work well regardless of inclement weather, whereas honey bees only perform at their best on calm, warm, sunny days.

Burrack adds:

This can make a big difference, since blueberries bloom in March and April in North Carolina. That means the weather can swing from great to awful, as we saw this year. 

We've shown that there is a real financial benefit associated with biodiversity. The next step is to figure out how to foster that diversity in practical terms.

Some research allegedly points to having native, flowering plants near blueberry fields to increase native bee populations over time, but the researchers wish to see what role crop management can play in fostering bee diversity at crop sites.

This is incredibly good news but more and more studies, including this one from Harvard, are demonstrating that neonicotinoid pesticides are largely responsible for major bee declines. So in order for this bee-diversity finding to apply, their health needs to come first - and as you can see, the bees pay it forward to us many times over.

The paper, "Bee species diversity enhances productivity and stability in a perennial crop," was published May 9 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE. Lead author of the paper is Shelley Rogers, a former graduate student at NC State who received an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship to support this work.

Image credit: Wikimedia Commons, Gordana Adamovic-Mladenovic from Windsor, Canada

Heather Callaghan is a natural health blogger and food freedom activist. You can see her work at NaturalBlaze.com and ActivistPost.com. Like at Facebook.

Dozens Killed By Freakishly Huge Hornets In China – And Now They Are Attacking People In The U.S. Too

Dozens Killed By Freakishly Huge Hornets In China – And Now They Are Attacking People In The U.S. Too
Sept 30, 2013 | The Truth Wins | Michael Synder

The photo of an Asian giant hornet posted above was taken by blogger Kurt Bell, and as you can see, these Asian giant hornets are freakishly huge.  They are also extremely aggressive and they are not afraid to attack people at all.  And as you will read about below, getting stung by one of them is exceedingly painful.  If they only attacked humans once in a while, it wouldn’t be that big of a deal.  Unfortunately, Asian giant hornets appear to be multiplying rapidly and they have killed dozens of people in China in recent months.  But most Americans are not going to get too concerned about a plague of giant hornets on the other side of the planet.  Well, what if I told you that Asian giant hornets are now spreading like wildfire in this country and attacking people all over the United States?  Would I have your attention then?  Because that is precisely what is happening.


The recent giant hornet attacks in China have made headlines all over the globe.  For example, the following is an excerpt from a recent article in the Guardian…

Twenty-eight people have died and hundreds have been injured in a wave of attacks by giant hornets in central China, according to reports.

Victims described being chased for hundreds of meters by the creatures and stung as many as 200 times.

How would you like to be stung 200 times?

And when you get stung by one of these giant hornets, it is immensely painful and it can dissolve your skin…

Being stung feels “like a hot nail through my leg,” as one entomologist put it, and their venom can dissolve skin. They’re fast, too, flying up to 25 miles per hour (41 kilometers an hour). They’re also the largest hornets on the planet, reaching 5.5 centimeters (2.2 inches).

You can’t outrun these hornets and they are unbelievably vicious.  Just check out what they do to other bees…

The Asian giant hornet is the world’s largest hornet, and is a voracious predator that dines on mantises, bees and other large insects. It has a deservedly evil reputation for wiping out entire hives containing thousands of honeybees by biting off the bees’ heads and then stealing their honey and bee larvae. The hornets are capable of flying up to 62 miles (100 kilometers) in a single day at speeds of 25 mph (40 km/h).

Asian giant hornets are five times larger than regular honey bees, and they have absolutely huge jaws.  They work incredibly quickly and they can kill up to 40 honey bees in a single minute.

Perhaps this is one of the factors that is contributing to the massive decline in the honey bee population around the globe.

But much more frightening is what these giant hornets are now doing to humans.  Just check out the following example from a recent Quartz article…

Here’s a chilling scene that Chen Changlin, an Ankang farmer, witnessed one evening a few days ago. As he harvested rice on evening, hornets swarmed a woman and child working nearby. When they reached Chen, they stung him for three minutes straight. Chen made it; the other two died. “The more you run, the more they want to chase you,” said another victim, whose kidneys were ravaged by the venom. When he was admitted to the hospital, his urine was the color of soy sauce.

Of course these giant predators no longer reside just in Asia.  Thanks to “free trade”, they are now also in Europe…

That’s why bee populations in France, where Chinese hornets arrived via a Chinese pottery shipment in 2005, have already taken a hit. Since then, Chinese hornets have spread at a pace of up to 100 km (62 miles) a year. Within the last three years, they’ve invaded Spain, Portugal and Belgium; soon they’ll arrive in Italy and the UK, says the European Environment Agency.

And even though most Americans don’t realize this, they are also spreading all over the United States as well.

According to one very disturbing news report, there have been recent sightings of Asian giant hornets all over the United States…

A forum on DSLReports.com Need to kill Asian Hornets and comments on a BadSpiderBites.com Giant Hornet article includes reports of Asian Giant Hornets in Alabama, California, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, and West Virginia. One of the pictures from a contributor from Tennessee shows a European Hornet. Last Fall posters reported aggressive infestations in recent years. In Georgia a poster reports he doesn’t go a day without seeing one of the giant hornets. One poster reports the insects flying into lights at night, and an infestation in a chimney with about 200 hornets getting inside the house. Many posters scoff at the comments that the insects aren’t aggressive. Some posters report that the large hornets are not affected by wasp/hornet spray.

Over time, Asian giant hornets will greatly multiply in this country and will be found almost everywhere.

So not only are millions of Americans losing their good paying jobs to “free trade”, we are also getting the added bonus of an endless plague of human-killing giant hornets.

These giant hornets don’t just attack little kids and elderly people.  They will even attack full grown men.  For example, just check out what happened to one man in Virginia…

I live in Richmond Virginia, & my parents live in King William Virginia. One day while visiting my folks, I was standing in their yard, talking to my mother with my arms crossed, when I heard what sounded like a rc airplane in a full on nosedive. I looked up just in time to see a humming bird sized hornet, identical to the picture of the Asian giant hornet, coming straight at me. It stung me on top of my ear & I have NEVER experienced such pain in my life, before, or since. The pain lasted for hours.

I am pierced & tattood all over, none of them hurt. This hurt. I cursed & cried like a little baby right in front of my mother. I am not allergic to bee or wasp stings, yet my entire face swelled up to extremely scary proportions. I have seen European hornets & cicada killers before. Nope, not it. Plus this thing was huge, & quite obviously, extremely aggressive, since I was doing NOTHING. Standing in the yard with my arms crossed. Not messing with a nest, not cutting grass, not doing jack. I have easily seen a dozen since that incident, & NO ONE will convince me they are not here. Yes it gets hot in VA, but NEVER over 100-105 degrees, so try again with the “It gets too hot here” B.S.. They ARE here.

Yes, they are here and now there is even a Facebook group dedicated to sharing spottings of Asian giant hornets in the United States.

What will you do when these vicious predators decide to take up residence in your neighborhood?

About the author: Michael T. Snyder is a former Washington D.C. attorney who now publishes The Truth. His new thriller entitled “The Beginning Of The End” is now available on Amazon.com.

Thousands of Genetically Modified Insects Set For Release

© Natural Society

Thousands of Genetically Modified Insects Set For Release
Sept 6, 2013 | Natural Society | Anthony Gucciardi

Just when you thought genetically modified mosquitoes and mutated dinner entrees were the extent of biotech’s hunger to manipulate the genetic coding of the planet, scientists have now unleashed a plan to launch thousands of ‘frankenfly’ style insects into the wild in order to combat pests.

And just like we saw with the release of genetically modified mosquitoes, the altered insects are actually being pushed as a ‘green alternative’ to the use of chemicals. You see, British scientists claim that mutating the genetic code of the insects is actually a way of substituting for the use of chemical pesticides. Chemical pesticides used to lower the population of olive flies in Britain. The reality here, however, is that you are taking something damaging like chemical pesticides and replacing it with something far worse.

It’s like trading in your aging car for a bicycle, except in this case the bicycle also happens to include side effects like ‘may alter the genetic structure of the entire insect population’.

According to the Daily Mail, which dubs these insects as ‘frankenflies’ (and rightfully so), the frankenflies are meant to kill the offspring of the olive flies when the genetically modified flies mate with wild olive flies:

“The trial would involve releasing genetically modified male olive flies which would mate with the wild females with the result that all the female offspring would die at the larvae or maggot stage.”

In other words, they are actually trying to mutate the genetic code to sterilize and eliminate the population of flies. So what does this mean for animals that eat these flies as a part of their routine diet? Or how about the humans that then eat these animals, or maybe even somehow eat the flies themselves? The Daily Mail goes on to state:

“However critics fear the development could put human health at risk if people eat the flies or their larvae if they reach food products.”

It looks like this legitimate fear doesn’t seem to stop (or even affect) scientists who insist on unleashing the genetically modified frankenflies into the environment at large. Perhaps their suggestion is to not eat any animal that may have consumed the fly, any plant that may have came in contact with the fly, and to stay indoors to avoid any physical contact with anything the fly touched?

Let’s stop the mad scientist ideology of bloated biotech corporations and instead return to an age of reality and reason.

About the Author

Google Plus Profile Anthony is the Editor of NaturalSociety, producer, consultant, and seeker of truth. Anthony's work has been read by millions worldwide and is routinely featured on major alternative and mainstream news website alike, like the powerful Drudge Report, NaturalNews, Infowars, and many others. Anthony has appeared, oftentimes routinely, on programs like Russia Today (RT), The Alex Jones Show, Coast to Coast AM, and others. Anthony is also a founding member of Natural Attitude and the creator of the independent political website Storyleak

Dragonflies can see by switching 'on' and 'off'

A Tau Emerald dragonfly (Hemicordulia tau) in mid flight.
Credit: Fir0002/Flagstaffotos, via Wikimedia Commons

Dragonflies can see by switching 'on' and 'off'
Aug 15, 2013 | Phys.org

Researchers at the University of Adelaide have discovered a novel and complex visual circuit in a dragonfly's brain that could one day help to improve vision systems for robots.

Dr Steven Wiederman and Associate Professor David O'Carroll from the University's Centre for Neuroscience Research have been studying the underlying processes of insect vision and applying that knowledge in robotics and artificial vision systems.

Their latest discovery, published this month in The Journal of Neuroscience, is that the brains of dragonflies combine opposite pathways - both an ON and OFF switch - when processing information about simple dark objects.

"To perceive the edges of objects and changes in light or darkness, the brains of many animals, including insects, frogs, and even humans, use two independent pathways, known as ON and OFF channels," says lead author Dr Steven Wiederman.

"Most animals will use a combination of ON switches with other ON switches in the brain, or OFF and OFF, depending on the circumstances. But what we show occurring in the dragonfly's brain is the combination of both OFF and ON switches. This happens in response to simple dark objects, likely to represent potential prey to this aerial predator.

"Although we've found this new visual circuit in the dragonfly, it's possible that many other animals could also have this circuit for perceiving various objects," Dr Wiederman says.

Watch Video

The researchers were able to record their results directly from 'target-selective' neurons in dragonflies' brains. They presented the dragonflies with moving lights that changed in intensity, as well as both light and dark targets.

"We discovered that the responses to the dark targets were much greater than we expected, and that the dragonfly's ability to respond to a dark moving target is from the correlation of opposite contrast pathways: OFF with ON," Dr Wiederman says.

"The exact mechanisms that occur in the brain for this to happen are of great interest in visual neurosciences generally, as well as for solving engineering applications in target detection and tracking. Understanding how visual systems work can have a range of outcomes, such as in the development of neural prosthetics and improvements in robot vision.

"A project is now underway at the University of Adelaide to translate much of the research we've conducted into a robot, to see if it can emulate the dragonfly's vision and movement. This project is well underway and once complete, watching our autonomous dragonfly robot will be very exciting," he says.

31 Percent Of U.S. Honey Bees Were Wiped Out This Year – Who Will Pollinate Our Crops?

© TheTruthWins.com

 31 Percent Of U.S. Honey Bees Were Wiped Out This Year – Who Will Pollinate Our Crops?
Aug 4, 2013 | The Truth Wins | Michael Synder

If bees keep dying off at this rate, we are going to be facing a horrific agricultural crisis very rapidly in the United States.  Last winter, 31 percent of all U.S. bee colonies were wiped out.  The year before that it was 21 percent.  These colony losses are being described as “catastrophic” by those in the industry, and nobody is quite sure how to fix the problem.  Some are blaming the bee deaths on pesticides, others are blaming parasites and others are blaming cell phones.  But no matter what is causing these deaths, if it doesn’t stop we will all soon notice the effects at the supermarket.  Bees pollinate about a hundred different crops in the United States, and if the bees disappear nobody is quite sure how we will be able to continue to grow many of those crops.  This emerging crisis does not get a lot of attention from the mainstream media, but if we continue to lose 30 percent of our bees every year it is going to have a cataclysmic effect on our food supply.

The frightening thing is that the bee deaths appear to be accelerating and they appear to be even worse in the UK and Canada…

This past winter was one of the worst on record for bees. In the U.S., beekeepers lost 31 percent of their colonies, compared to a loss of 21 percent the previous winter. In Canada, the Canadian Honey Council reports an annual loss of 35 percent of honey bee colonies in the last three years. In Britain, the Bee Farmers’ Association says its members lost roughly half their colonies over the winter.

“It has been absolutely catastrophic,” said Margaret Ginman, who is general secretary of the Bee Farmers’ Association. “This has been one of the worst years in living memory.”

Scientists have been scrambling to figure out what is causing this, and one study that was recently conducted by researchers at the University of Maryland and the U.S. Department of Agriculture may have some answers…

The study, published July 24 in the online journal PLOS ONE, is the first analysis of real-world conditions encountered by honey bees as their hives pollinate a wide range of crops, from apples to watermelons.

The researchers collected pollen from honey bee hives in fields from Delaware to Maine. They analyzed the samples to find out which flowering plants were the bees’ main pollen sources and what agricultural chemicals were commingled with the pollen. The researchers fed the pesticide-laden pollen samples to healthy bees, which were then tested for their ability to resist infection with Nosema ceranae – a parasite of adult honey bees that has been linked to a lethal phenomenon known as colony collapse disorder.

On average, the pollen samples contained 9 different agricultural chemicals, including fungicides, insecticides, herbicides and miticides. Sublethal levels of multiple agricultural chemicals were present in every sample, with one sample containing 21 different pesticides. Pesticides found most frequently in the bees’ pollen were the fungicide chlorothalonil, used on apples and other crops, and the insecticide fluvalinate, used by beekeepers to control Varroa mites, common honey bee pests.

The particular parasite mentioned above, Nosema ceranae, is extremely destructive to honeybees, and this study found that some pesticides and fungicides make it much more likely that bees will become infected by these parasites…

When researchers collected pollen from hives on the east coast pollinating cranberry, watermelon and other crops and fed it to healthy bees, those bees showed a significant decline in their ability to resist infection by a parasite called Nosema ceranae. The parasite has been implicated in Colony Collapse Disorder though scientists took pains to point out that their findings do not directly link the pesticides to CCD. The pollen was contaminated on average with nine different pesticides and fungicides though scientists discovered 21 agricultural chemicals in one sample. Scientists identified eight ag chemicals associated with increased risk of infection by the parasite.

Most disturbing, bees that ate pollen contaminated with fungicides were three times as likely to be infected by the parasite. Widely used, fungicides had been thought to be harmless for bees as they’re designed to kill fungus, not insects, on crops like apples.

“There’s growing evidence that fungicides may be affecting the bees on their own and I think what it highlights is a need to reassess how we label these agricultural chemicals,” Dennis vanEngelsdorp, the study’s lead author, told Quartz.

So are these pesticides and fungicides the cause of Colony Collapse disorder?

The authors of the study stated very clearly that they were not making that conclusion.

But it does seem more than coincidental that continental Europe is not seeing bees die in the same kinds of numbers and they have banned many of these pesticides and fungicides.  The following is from a recent article by Christina Sarich…

A study by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has labeled one pesticide, called clothianidin, as completely unacceptable for use, and banned it from use entirely. Meanwhile, the U.S. uses the same pesticide on more than a third of its crops – nearly 143 million acres. Two more pesticides linked to bee death are imidacloprid, and thiamethoxam. These are also used extensively in the US, while elsewhere, they have been taken out of circulation.

There are others that are not entirely convinced that pesticides and fungicides are the primary cause of the mass bee deaths that we are seeing.  In some cases, tens of millions of bees are dying all at once.  How could that be caused by pesticides and fungicides?  The following is from a recent article by Arjun Walia…

It’s not just the United States, Elmwood, Canada also recently reported a discovery of over  30 million dead bees. The massive bee deaths in Elmwood came shortly after approximately 50 thousand bees were found dead in an Oregon parking lot.

No matter what the true cause is, we need to find a solution quickly because if we start running out of honey bees we will rapidly be facing a nightmarish agricultural apocalypse.

Just check out the following list of crops that are pollinated by honey bees…

• Apples
• Mangos
• Rambutan
• Kiwi Fruit
• Plums
• Peaches
• Nectarines
• Guava
• Rose Hips
• Pomegranites
• Pears
• Black and Red Currants
• Alfalfa
• Okra
• Strawberries
• Onions
• Cashews
• Cactus
• Prickly Pear
• Apricots
• Allspice
• Avocados
• Passion Fruit
• Lima Beans
• Kidney Beans
• Adzuki Beans
• Green Beans
• Orchid Plants
• Custard Apples
• Cherries
• Celery
• Coffee
• Walnut
• Cotton
• Lychee
• Flax
• Acerola – used in Vitamin C supplements
• Macadamia Nuts
• Sunflower Oil
• Goa beans
• Lemons
• Buckwheat
• Figs
• Fennel
• Limes
• Quince
• Carrots
• Persimmons
• Palm Oil
• Loquat
• Durian
• Cucumber
• Hazelnut
• Cantaloupe
• Tangelos
• Coriander
• Caraway
• Chestnut
• Watermelon
• Star Apples
• Coconut
• Tangerines
• Boysenberries
• Starfruit
• Brazil Nuts
•  Beets
• Mustard Seed
• Rapeseed
• Broccoli
• Cauliflower
• Cabbage
• Brussels Sprouts
• Bok Choy (Chinese Cabbage)
• Turnips
• Congo Beans
• Sword beans
• Chili peppers, red peppers, bell peppers, green peppers
• Papaya
• Safflower
• Sesame
• Eggplant
• Raspberries
• Elderberries
• Blackberries
• Clover
• Tamarind
• Cocoa
• Black Eyed Peas
• Vanilla
• Cranberries
• Tomatoes
• Grapes

Can you imagine life without those foods?

I can’t either.

But if bees keep dying off like this, first those crops will start becoming extremely expensive and then they will start disappearing from our store shelves altogether.

About the author: Michael T. Snyder is a former Washington D.C. attorney who now publishes The Truth.  His new novel entitled “The Beginning Of The End” is now available on Amazon.com.