Published GMO studies find no evidence of harm when corrected for multiple comparisons

Abstract

A number of widely debated research articles claiming possible technology-related health concerns have influenced the public opinion on genetically modified food safety. We performed a statistical reanalysis and review of experimental data presented in some of these studies and found that quite often in contradiction with the authors’ conclusions the data actually provides weak evidence of harm that cannot be differentiated from chance. In our opinion the problem of statistically unaccounted multiple comparisons has led to some of the most cited anti-genetically modified organism health claims in history. We hope this analysis puts the original results of these studies into proper context.

Keywords:

• Genetic engineering
• genetic modification
• GMO
• health
• safety
• statistics
• transgenic

Declaration of interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of this article. This article was not financed by any non-government organization or lobbied by any entity, except for the common sense. This study was supported by the Russian Science Foundation (project 14-50-00150). The funding body did not in any way interfere with or participate in the preparation of the article. A.I.T. was supported by NIH grant EY02238. We are grateful to anonymous reviewers who suggested a number of improvements for our article.