Medico-Biological Aspects Of Safety Of Use In Nutrition Of The Population Of Ukraine The Genetically Modified Plants

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I.R. Barilyak

Igor R. Barilyak, Maria P. Gulich, Taisiya G. Omelyanets

Ukrainian Scientific Centre of Hygiene, 252660, 50, Popudrenko str., Kiev-94, Ukraine

The problem of the use in nutrition of the population of the foods derived from genetically modified plants is urgent and very serious for Ukraine. The adverse ecological situation, especially after Chernobyl accident, decrease of the health index of the population in Ukraine require the more cautious attitude to use in feed of such products, than in countries with a more favourable ecological situation. According to the International General Principles of the Safety Precautions of the UNEP in biotechnology, 'organisms with new attributes, which are considered to be harmless in one region can become potentially harmful in other with other ecological conditions'. The experience of use of the genetically modified plants in conditions which analogous of the ecological situation in Ukraine in world is practical absent. And, in general, experience of the use of such products in different regions of the world is rather small to judge the remote consequences of their influence them on the human organism. The consequences of the influence of the products of plant origin with recombined DNA of the microorganisms on the normal human microflora, especially among the persons with reduced immunological reactivity have not been elucidated too. Therefore, is not excluded the possibility, that using in nutrition of the population of Ukraine genetically modified plants directly touch a problem of the human health protection, the questions of ecological safety and assessment of socio-economic consequences.

Watchfulness and alarm of the scientists and public cause also the absence in Ukraine of the:

  • Legislative – legal base in the sphere of safe use of biotechproducts;
  • Criteria and mechanisms of the valuation of the safety such products;
  • System of the measures on the reduction of possible risks;
  • State assistance of the monitoring, scientific researches, exchange of the information.

For the decision of these questions, as well as the creation of the national concept of the biosafety, development of principles of the state and public policy in the sphere of production and use of plant biotechnology it is necessary to consolidate all the efforts of the specialists in various spheres of knowledge: biotechnology, medical genetics, hygiene, ecology and other.