Cell-based breast milk might offer mothers and babies a better alternative to expensive formula in the coming years. Alternative health champion Joseph Mercola has turned the COVID-19 pandemic into a lucrative, science-free marketing opportunity. Pharmaceutical companies used groundbreaking mRNA technology to develop coronavirus vaccines. Scientists are using the same platform to develop other important therapies, including cancer and flu vaccines.

Join geneticist Kevin Folta and GLP contributor Cameron English on this episode of Science Facts and Fallacies as they break down these latest news stories:

* Cell-based breast milk for mothers and babies inches towards reality

Recent genetics research has shown that some mothers aren't able to breast freed, or at least can't produce enough milk to sustain their newborns. Using technology similar to that used to make lab-grown meat, a biotech startup is developing cell-based breast milk for individual women. In the coming years, the technology could offer mothers and babies a potentially better alternative to formula.

* Viewpoint: Dr. Joseph Mercola’s war on mainstream medicine — ‘His take on the pandemic is a lucrative conspiratorial dream’

Dr. Joe Mercola, champion of all things alternative health and vocal vaccine critic, has been very active over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. Alongside Organic Consumers' Association founder Ronnie Cummins, the physician-turned-supplement salesman has authored a book alleging that SARS-COV-2 is an engineered bioweapon the elites have used to expand their global influence. What's wrong this story? Almost everything. The bigger problem, however, is that figures like Mercola distract people from real problems that need to be addressed before the next pandemic comes along.

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* The mRNA biotechnology revolution unleashed by COVID vaccine breakthroughs is just beginning — and it will i...

[dropcap]M[/dropcap]exico seems determined to ban the weedkiller glyphosate and biotech crops, drawing intense opposition from the country’s farmers. Twitter bots that parrot anti-GMO messaging falsely suggest that opposition to genetic engineering is widespread. An effective malaria vaccine may be on the horizon, helping public health experts stem a deadly disease that continues to plague countries ... Read more

Mexico seems determined to ban the weedkiller glyphosate and biotech crops, drawing intense opposition from the country's farmers. Twitter bots that parrot anti-GMO messaging falsely suggest that opposition to genetic engineering is widespread. An effective malaria vaccine may be on the horizon, helping public health experts stem a deadly disease that continues to plague countries around the world.

Join geneticist Kevin Folta and GLP contributor Cameron English on this episode of Science Facts and Fallacies as they break down these latest news stories:

* Farmers warn Mexico’s GM corn ban will raise food prices

Infiltrated by anti-GMO activists, Mexico's government continues to enact policies that restrict farmer access to vital weed killers and genetically engineered crops that promote sustainable agriculture. These measures are ostensibly motivated by concern for public health and the environment, though the evidence, and now a growing chorus of farmers, say otherwise. The country's push to attain "food self-sufficiency" may be motivated by little else than ideology and politics.

* Bot lies: How the anti-GMO movement uses social media to hype opposition to genetically-engineered mosquitoes to rid Florida of insect-spread diseases

Is public opposition to genetic engineering an organic (excuse the pun) movement organized by grassroots activists, or a carefully illustrated by PR stunt by a handful of wealthy NGOs? The proliferation of anti-GMO Twitter bots, each parroting the message tweeted by the one before it, provides a new line of evidence that America's anti-biotech movement is manipulating social media to spread its message by any means necessary.

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* 7 people contract malaria every second. We are finally on the verge of engineering a vaccine to stymie one of the world’s most relentless killers

Scientists have worked for years to introduce an effective malaria vaccine. More than 140 candidate shots are in various stages of development, and one immunization, engineered by the pharmaceutical firm GlaxoSmithKline looked very promising. Unfortunately, the company's vaccine wasn't able to achieve long-term efficacy over 30 percent. That may change in the coming years.

Thanks to innovations in vaccine production, researchers have developed a shot that stimulates a bigger immune response than its predece...

[dropcap]M[/dropcap]any Hollywood celebrities have endorsed the bogus link between vaccines to autism. Looking back, it appears their influence has been more limited than scientists originally feared. Did SARS-COV-2 leak from a laboratory? Scientists are divided, and the issue is becoming increasingly political. African countries under threat by ravenous locusts have rejected warnings from Greenpeace and ... Read more

Many Hollywood celebrities have endorsed the bogus link between vaccines to autism. Looking back, it appears their influence has been more limited than scientists originally feared. Did SARS-COV-2 leak from a laboratory? Scientists are divided, and the issue is becoming increasingly political. African countries under threat by ravenous locusts have rejected warnings from Greenpeace and eagerly utilized synthetic pesticides to protect their crops.

Join geneticist Kevin Folta and GLP contributor Cameron English on this episode of Science Facts and Fallacies as they break down these latest news stories:

* Viewpoint: Vaccines and autism — How Hollywood fame and fortune can lead to dangerous promotion of false cures, false causes and false hopes

Scientists have blasted celebrities like Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey for blaming autism on vaccines. While Hollywood A-listers have undoubtedly influenced how the public thinks about vaccine safety, recent research indicates that movie stars and models haven't been as persuasive as many experts believed they would be. What can scientists and educators learn from this development?

* Top US scientists concluded last spring that the Wuhan COVID lab leak theory is plausible and should be investigated, leaked classified documents show

Once considered a conspiracy theory, the possibility that SARS-COV-2 escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology has gained traction in recent months. Many scientists remain convinced that the pandemic has a natural origin, but unanswered questions about the World Health Organization's investigation into the initial outbreak in China and evidence that the virus didn't come from a wet market have forced policymakers to more carefully consider a lab scenario.

* Africa cracks down on ravenous locust swarms by ignoring Greenpeace’s anti-pesticide rhetoric

Swarms of crop-destroying locusts have devastated several nations in east Africa over the last year, fueling fears that millions of people in these countries could go hungry. Desperate farmers unsuccessfully tried to rid their fields of locusts by lighting tires on fire and blowing whistles to scare the insects away.

Greenpeace has consistently warned regulators to avoid using synthetic pesticides to fight the swarms. But the effected countries have mostly disregarded the activist group's advice and, as a result, appear to be bringing the crisis to an end. Is this another example of anti-pesticide groups gradually losing their influence in international politics?

Kevin M. Folta is a professor in the Horticultural Sciences Department at the University of Florida. Follow Professor Folta on Twitter @kevinfolta

[dropcap]E[/dropcap]uropean food retailers want food made from CRISPR-edited crops labeled “GMO,” which could prevent EU farmers from utilizing gene editing technology. The weedkiller glyphosate is thought to pose little risk to humans and animals, but a new study suggests the herbicide could threaten insects. How worried should we be? CRISPR may one day replace statins ... Read more

European food retailers want food made from CRISPR-edited crops labeled "GMO," which could prevent EU farmers from utilizing gene editing technology. The weedkiller glyphosate is thought to pose little risk to humans and animals, but a new study suggests the herbicide could threaten insects. How worried should we be? CRISPR may one day replace statins as a treatment for high cholesterol.

Join geneticist Kevin Folta and GLP contributor Cameron English on this episode of Science Facts and Fallacies as they break down these latest news stories:

* Should food derived from CRISPR gene-edited seeds be labeled as GMO — all but ensuring they will not be adopted? Many EU food retailers say ‘yes’

Support for agricultural gene editing is growing in the EU, but popular food retailers around the continent are joining forces to lobby against the technology's introduction. While there is no scientific justification for keeping gene-edited seeds out of European agriculture, these business interests say allowing the enhanced seeds into the food supply would deny consumers "the right to know" what they're eating. If successful, this effort on the part of the grocery industry could hinder Europe's push to finally embrace some genetic engineering applications in food production.

* Viewpoint: Glyphosate is great at killing weeds, but there are concerns its use could imperil the microbiome of some insects — both beneficial and harmful

Glyphosate is an effective weedkiller, but according to a new study, the same quality that makes it such a great herbicide may also pose a serious threat to a wide variety of insects. The chemical inhibits the production of certain amino acids made by bacteria that live in the guts of grain beetles (Oryzaephilus surinamensis), hindering their ability to survive drought and predator attacks. Others species also depend on these amino acids, so there is new concern about glyphosate's potential impact on biodiversity. How big of a threat are we talking about?

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* Dangerously high cholesterol? CRISPR gene editing could lower it, tests on monkeys suggest

Disabling a gene (PCSK9) that inhibits the body's ability to remove LDL can be used to lower dangerously high cholesterol—at least in monkeys. Drugs that limit production of the protein PCSK9 codes for exist, but they aren't effective enough to make a dent in rates o...

[dropcap]A[/dropcap] just-published study found that consuming two or more sugar-sweetened beverages in a day is linked to a doubling of colon cancer risk in women. The research generated dozens of headlines, all warning readers of the potential danger posed by regular soda intake. But a closer look at the study reveals some key limitations that ... Read more

A just-published study found that consuming two or more sugar-sweetened beverages in a day is linked to a doubling of colon cancer risk in women. The research generated dozens of headlines, all warning readers of the potential danger posed by regular soda intake. But a closer look at the study reveals some key limitations that prevent us from drawing any firm conclusions from the data:

* A small sample size: only 109 people out of more than 40,000 developed the disease, making it difficult to establish a correlation between sugar and colon cancer

* Study participants reported their soda consumption using food frequency questionnaires, which many epidemiologists have argued are notoriously unreliable sources of data.

* Many previous studies have failed to find an association between sugar and colon cancer, and some research has even found that it could have a protective effect against the disease.

For these and several other reasons, the new study is somewhat of an outlier and thus worthy of heightened scrutiny, cancer epidemiologist Geoffrey Kabat wrote in a recent article for GLP. But this didn't stop reporters (with the help of the study authors) from speculating about the significance of the paper:

Human beings are so constructed that when we read such a news story, we immediately take the highlighted finding as if it were true and worry that something we had considered relatively harmless—drinking sweetened beverages— could be adversely affecting our health or the health of people close to us. People who have an interest in publicizing this type of result (scientist authors, journal editors, and journalists) know that stories like this provoke a visceral reaction. The logic behind this kind of reporting could be distilled down to the injunction, “Start worrying—details to follow.”

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The problem is much greater than a single eye-grabbing paper, Kabat argued. There is an entire sub-discipline within epidemiology, known as risk-factor epidemiology, that tries to correlate particular chemical exposures with complex diseases like cancer. While not inherently flawed, research in this field is prone to exaggeration and risks misleading the public about the risks they face from food, chemicals and other environmental exposures. As Kabat put it:

Over the years, a number of prominent epidemiologists have criticized risk factor epidemiology and “approaches that abstract single elements … from the complexity of the life and times of people and relate these to a single health outcome.

Where did SARS-COV-2 come from? For most of the last year a natural origin story was the predominant view among experts. But the situation isn't so clear today. Why did some vaccine skeptics end up getting their COVID shots? And could their stories help expand vaccine uptake moving forward? With the benefit of hindsight, what can we say about the now-infamous J&J vaccine "pause" in April?

Join GLP contributor Cameron English and guest host Ally Kennedy on this episode of Science Facts and Fallacies as they break down these latest news stories:

* Debating the possible origins of COVID-19: A lab-escaped bioweapon? Animal poop? Random mutations of an existing virus?

Considered a conspiracy theory just a year ago, the possibility that SARS-COV-2 was leaked from a laboratory is now a serious hypothesis, alongside the idea that the virus naturally evolved and jumped from other animals to humans. This status change for the so-called "laboratory spillover" explanation was prompted by a China–WHO joint study released in early 2021. The 313-page investigation dedicated just four pages to the possibility of a lab accident, prompting 16 scientists to call for a more thorough examination of how the virus arose:

We must take hypotheses about both natural and laboratory spillovers seriously until we have sufficient data. A proper investigation should be transparent, objective, data-driven, inclusive of broad expertise, subject to independent oversight, and responsibly managed to minimize the impact of conflicts of interest. Public health agencies and research laboratories alike need to open their records to the public.

* Making the leap from ‘no’ to ‘yes’: Here’s why some vaccine hesitators decided to get a shot

Why do some vaccine-hesitant Americans ultimately get their COVID shots? For some it's a simple matter of getting to attend baseball games again, while others worry that they won't be able to care for their children if they get infected. Whatever their motivations, their stories could offer insights to public health officials eager to convince even more vaccine skeptics to come around.

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