Genetically modified crops safety assessments: present limits and possible improvements

We have thoroughly reviewed these tests from a statistical and a biological point of view. Some of these tests used controversial protocols which are discussed and statistically significant results that were considered as not being biologically meaningful by regulatory authorities, thus raising the question of their interpretations.Several convergent data appear to indicate liver and kidney problems as end points of GMO diet effects in the above-mentioned experiments. This was confirmed by our meta-analysis of all the in vivo studies published, which revealed that the kidneys were particularly affected, concentrating 43.5% of all disrupted parameters in males, whereas the liver was more specifically disrupted in females (30.8% of all disrupted parameters).The 90-day-long tests are insufficient to evaluate chronic toxicity, and the signs highlighted in the kidneys and livers could be the onset of chronic diseases. However, no minimal length for the tests is yet obligatory for any of the GMOs cultivated on a large scale, and this is socially unacceptable in terms of consumer health protection. We are suggesting that the studies should be improved and prolonged, as well as being made compulsory, and that the sexual hormones should be assessed too, and moreover, reproductive and multigenerational studies ought to be conducted too.Recently, an ongoing debate on international regulation has been taking place on the capacity to predict and avoid adverse effects on health and the environment for new products and novel food/feed (GMOs, chemicals, pesticides, nanoparticles, etc.). The health risk assessments are often, but not always, based on the study of blood analyses of mammals eating these products in subchronic tests, and more rarely in chronic tests. In particular, in the case of GMOs, the number and nature of parameters assessed, the length of the necessary tests, the statistics used and their interpretations are the subject of controversies, especially in the applica