Safe to eat?

Is food safety being left in wrong hands? According to research, genetically modified foods have no potential risks for human beings, but how can scientists be so sure of this? It is hard to predict how synthetic our food may become or how it will affect our bodies.

I find it shocking that many of my classmates and the majority of Americans do not know the ingredients in their food, who produced it, or how it was produced. However, this is not entirely their fault. I am more dismayed by the American government and the curtain it has put up in front of the food industry.

Barack Obama has finally made the decision to follow the European Union, Japan and Australia and begin labeling modified products along with increasing the funding for the National Organic Certification Cost-Share Program. After learning this, I ask, who is actually in charge of regulating and changing America's diet?

In recent news, Obama has appointed Michael Taylor, former vice president of Monsanto, a company responsible for spreading food-borne illnesses, as senior adviser to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration commissioner on food safety. Deciding whether genetically modified foods are safe to eat has been placed in the hands of the companies that created them. We cannot trust our government with nutrition, let alone informing us with the truth about what we are eating.

The U.S will soon be the only country left standing that does not label modified products. Don't we live in one of the most "progressive" countries in the world?

Erin Fonseca

Whitefish