It is not acceptable to not have a label on all my food I buy, so that is why I only buy Organic foods now, because atleast they will label it organic, and I know that it wont have round up in the DNA of my food I eat, and it wont have antibiotics in it to kill the Ecoli virus that is used to change the DNA of the foods I eat. How do you people sleep at night knowing you are causing CANCER and horrible diseases from putting all these deadly chemicals in the foods we eat everyday?

Expert response from Community Manager

Thursday, 15/10/2015 13:42

Food labeling questions have been answered several times on this site, some of which are compiled in this link. But, there is also some misunderstanding embedded in your question that I thought I’d address: 

1. Roundup® does not incorporate with DNA. In response to your concern on Roundup in your food, Roundup Ready® crops have a tolerance, or maximum residue level, which is set by the EPA.  This means that the total dietary exposure of glyphosate (active ingredient in Roundup agricultural herbicides) from all food and water sources must be within this acceptable dose level.  EPA has concluded that dietary exposure is at most only 13 percent of the acceptable dose level.  For a more in-depth explanation of this calculation and determination, I invite you to read these similar questions: 
   • Do Roundup Ready foods usually have higher glyphosate levels?
   • Is Roundup safe for human consumption.
2. Antibiotics are not added to crop-based foods. Animals that are treated with antibiotics follow a withdrawal period that specifies a time between the antibiotic and harvest of meat, milk or eggs to ensure that the antibiotic has cleared the body and would therefore not be present in the food products.   
3. E. coli is not a virus. It is a bacterium that can be either a commensal (harmless) or a pathogenic (causes disease) organism. One type of contamination that could result in ingestion of the pathogenic form of E. coli, is the use of manure on crops that was not adequately composted to destroy these organisms.  Selecting food labeled as organic or not labeled organic is not a guarantee that this will or will not be a problem.  But it can be a big problem since each year there are approximately 128,000 hospitalizations and 3,000 deaths attributed to food borne illnesses. 
4. Neither E. coli nor a virus is used to move DNA to a plant.  A bacterium called Agrobacterium tumefaciens moves the gene. This is the same bacteria that does this in nature and is responsible for the gall that you see on trees. 

Because I know that the products that I work on are safe and are helping to make accessible food available to all, I enjoy working at Monsanto. A recent answer posted by my colleague Allison Devitre also answers this question quite well.  

Expert response from Community Manager

Thursday, 15/10/2015 13:42

Food labeling questions have been answered several times on this site, some of which are compiled in this link. But, there is also some misunderstanding embedded in your question that I thought I’d address: 

1. Roundup® does not incorporate with DNA. In response to your concern on Roundup in your food, Roundup Ready® crops have a tolerance, or maximum residue level, which is set by the EPA.  This means that the total dietary exposure of glyphosate (active ingredient in Roundup agricultural herbicides) from all food and water sources must be within this acceptable dose level.  EPA has concluded that dietary exposure is at most only 13 percent of the acceptable dose level.  For a more in-depth explanation of this calculation and determination, I invite you to read these similar questions: 
   • Do Roundup Ready foods usually have higher glyphosate levels?
   • Is Roundup safe for human consumption.
2. Antibiotics are not added to crop-based foods. Animals that are treated with antibiotics follow a withdrawal period that specifies a time between the antibiotic and harvest of meat, milk or eggs to ensure that the antibiotic has cleared the body and would therefore not be present in the food products.   
3. E. coli is not a virus. It is a bacterium that can be either a commensal (harmless) or a pathogenic (causes disease) organism. One type of contamination that could result in ingestion of the pathogenic form of E. coli, is the use of manure on crops that was not adequately composted to destroy these organisms.  Selecting food labeled as organic or not labeled organic is not a guarantee that this will or will not be a problem.  But it can be a big problem since each year there are approximately 128,000 hospitalizations and 3,000 deaths attributed to food borne illnesses. 
4. Neither E. coli nor a virus is used to move DNA to a plant.  A bacterium called Agrobacterium tumefaciens moves the gene. This is the same bacteria that does this in nature and is responsible for the gall that you see on trees. 

Because I know that the products that I work on are safe and are helping to make accessible food available to all, I enjoy working at Monsanto. A recent answer posted by my colleague Allison Devitre also answers this question quite well.