Clayson D B
Toxicology Research Division, Health and Welfare Canada, Ottawa, Ontario.
Regul Toxicol Pharmacol. 1993 Apr;17(2 Pt 1):145-56. doi: 10.1006/rtph.1993.1014.
Those chemicals that are added to food during modern processing are most stringently examined for toxic effects and, if they demonstrate toxicity, are strictly controlled. Despite this, a considerable proportion of the North American human cancer burden has been associated with diet and nutrition. The possible contributions of excess calories, excess and wrongly balanced fats, natural contaminants, and naturally occurring carcinogens within the food supply to this horrendous burden of cancer is considered. The theoretically possible use of bioengineering techniques to modify the composition of food crops and thus to minimize the levels of carcinogens in the food supply is discussed. This is considered important since failure to monitor the effect of bioengineering may lead to an increase in the level of such noxious agents, especially if the goal of such bioengineering is to develop food crops with increased intrinsic resistance to pests and other spoilage organisms.
在现代食品加工过程中添加的那些化学物质，会针对其毒性进行最为严格的检测，若显示出毒性，则会受到严格管控。尽管如此，北美相当一部分的人类癌症负担仍与饮食和营养有关。人们考虑了食物供应中热量过剩、脂肪过量及不均衡、天然污染物和天然致癌物对这一可怕癌症负担可能产生的影响。文中还讨论了利用生物工程技术改变粮食作物成分从而降低食物供应中致癌物含量在理论上的可能性。这一点被认为很重要，因为若不监测生物工程的效果，可能会导致此类有害物质含量增加，特别是当这种生物工程的目标是培育对害虫和其他腐败生物具有更强内在抗性的粮食作物时。
