einkorn wheat, corn is among the oldest of cultivated grains, dating back 10,000 years to pre-Mayan times in South America, but corn didn’t make it onto European menus until 1493, when Christopher Columbus brought seeds to Spain. Corn was rapidly embraced, largely replacing barley and millet due to its spectacular yield per acre. Widespread, habitual consumption of cornbread and polenta resulted in deficiencies of niacin (vitamin B3) and the amino acids lysine and tryptophan, causing widespread epidemics of pellagra, evidenced as what doctors of the age called ‘The Four Ds’: dermatitis, diarrhoea, dementia and death. Even today, pellagra is a significant public health issue in rural South America, Africa and China. Meanwhile, in coastal Peru, Ecuador, Mexico and the Andes mountain highlands, increased corn consumption led to increased tooth decay, tooth loss, anaemia and iron deficiency, as well as loss of height in children and adults.32
Today, farmers fatten livestock by feeding them intact corn kernels. But much of the corn consumed by humans is in the form of cornflour, or derivatives of corn such as high-fructose corn syrup. This concentrated source of fructose is a form of sugar that fails to signal satiety – you don’t know when to stop. Corn and wheat jockey for inclusion in just about every processed food, many of which contain both. Corn in some form is therefore found in obvious sources, such as corn chips, cornbread, breakfast cereals, soft drinks with high-fructose corn syrup, tacos and tortillas, but also in some not-so-obvious foods, including hamburger meat, ketchup, salad dressings, yoghurt, soup mixes, sweets, seasoning mixes, mayonnaise, marinara sauce, fruit drinks and peanut butter.
Corn strains with the highest proportion of rapidly digested amylopectin, rather than the less efficiently digested amylose, are chosen to grind into cornflour. Given the exponential increase in surface area that results when corn is reduced to granules or powder, these products are responsible for extravagant rises in blood sugar. With a glycaemic index of 90 to 100, the highest of any food, they are perfectly crafted to contribute to diabetes.33
Corn allergies are on the rise, probably due to changes in alpha-amylase inhibitor proteins, lipid transfer proteins and others. Because the various grasses that we call ‘grains’ are genetically related, there can be overlapping grain allergies in humans exposed to them.34 Repeated and prolonged exposure to corn proteins, as in people who work in agriculture, food production or the pharmaceutical industry (cornflour is found in pills and capsules), can lead to as many as 90 per cent of workers developing a corn allergy.35 Such extravagant levels of allergy development do not occur in people working with apples, beef, kale or olives – only grains.
The zein protein of corn triggers antibodies reactive to wheat gliadin, which can lead to gastrointestinal distress, diarrhoea, bloating, bowel urgency and acid reflux after corn consumption.36 The immune response responsible for the destruction of the small intestine that occurs in people with coeliac disease can also be triggered, though less severely, by the zein protein of corn. Nevertheless, cornflour is – wrongly – used in gluten-free foods.37
Though they look quite different and the modern processed products that emerge from them look, smell and taste quite different, wheat and corn are too closely related for comfort. Minimal to no exposure is the desired strategy for non-ruminant Homo sapiens.
Genetic Modification: Don’t Look, Don’t Tell
Since gene-splicing technology made it possible to insert or remove specific genes in plants and animals, we have been reassured repeatedly by the FDA, the USDA and by agribusiness that the products of this technology are safe for the environment and for human consumption. And they have 90-day animal testing data to prove it.
While wheat was manipulated with methods that pre-date genetic modification and therefore didn’t raise many eyebrows, other genetically modified (GM) grains, especially corn and rice, have somehow escaped public scrutiny, and strains have made it onto supermarket shelves in North America and other parts of the world. Recent studies have raised questions about the safety of GM crops, as well as the herbicides and pesticides that go with them. One French research group, for instance, obtained internal proprietary research data from Monsanto that were used to justify claims of safety for both glyphosate-resistant corn and Bt toxin corn, the two most prevalent GM crops. (This information was not relinquished voluntarily, but rather was obtained by a court order.) When they tried to reproduce the Monsanto data but applied more detailed tissue analyses, they failed to reproduce the same benign findings, instead reporting evidence for kidney, liver, heart, spleen and adrenal toxicity with both forms of GM corn.38 The first effort to extend the period of observation beyond 90 days raised more disturbing questions. Over two years of observation, increased mortality, breast tumours, liver damage and pituitary disruption from both glyphosate-resistant corn and glyphosate itself were reported, in contrast to Monsanto’s benign 90-day findings.39
Further questions have been raised regarding the safety of Bt toxin corn. This strain of corn has a gene for a protein that’s toxic to insects inserted right into it, so it kills pests who try to eat the plant. While Bt toxin-expressing bacteria have been sprayed on crops by organic farmers for 40 years with apparent safety, critics have pointed out that GM corn now expresses Bt toxin within the seed (the corn kernels) directly ingested by consumers. One study in mice demonstrated toxic effects on blood cell formation,40 while another observed prediabetic patterns.41 Genetically modified rice has also been demonstrated to change the composition of bowel flora in mice, with decreased healthy Lactobacillus and increased unhealthy Escherichia coli species.42
Glyphosate itself, the world’s most widely used herbicide, is applied to glyphosate-resistant corn. Various studies suggest it has oestrogenic activity, promoting the growth of breast cancer cells; disrupts male fertility; and disrupts endocrine function in a number of other ways.43 There is also the issue of the environmental impact of glyphosate on wildlife, including aquatic bacteria and amphibians, such as frogs, which experience toxic effects.44
Interestingly, one strain of rice – Golden Rice, which has been genetically modified to express beta-carotene to alleviate the vitamin A deficiency that plagues rice-consuming societies – has been at the forefront of the biotechnology effort to paint genetic modification as something beautiful to behold and safe for consumption. Agribusiness giant Syngenta has been promoting Golden Rice as an example of what the science of genetic modification can accomplish, despite the vigorous opposition of many farmers who wish to avoid using GM grains. Critics have also accused its promoters of trying to capitalize on a common nutrient deficiency by a more profitable route than, say, just having vitamin A-deficient populations eat an occasional sweet potato, which would match or exceed the benefits provided by Golden Rice. (But you can’t trademark a regular, nutritious sweet potato.)
Much of the science purporting to explore the safety of GM crops reads more like marketing than science, with researchers gushing about the safety and nutrition of the crop, herbicide or pesticide in question, rather than impartially reporting the science. This brings us to the fundamental problem when deep-pocketed influences such as agribusiness or the pharmaceutical industry are involved: How much can we believe when much of the positive ‘science’ is generated by those who stand to benefit from it?
Rice
Despite sharing a genetic heritage with other grasses, rice is among the more benign of grains, though it’s far from harmless. Viewed from the perspective of the ancient human experience that reveals the destructive health effects of other grasses, ancient rice is the only grain that was not associated with effects such as increased tooth decay, facial malformations and iron deficiency.45 The less-harmful nature of rice can be partly explained by the very low content (less than 1 per cent) of prolamin proteins in rice.46
The history of rice as yet another seed of grasses consumed by humans dates back 8,000 years to the foothills of the Himalayas, followed by evidence for human cultivation in southern
