Re: “Do genetically modified foods disgust you?” (June 5), a commentary by Cass Sunstein:

Though hardly an expert on GMOs, Sunstein, director of Harvard’s behavioral economics and public policy program, clearly knows how to manipulate people, and his comments left me disgusted.

He claims that Democrats are “indifferent to science” and cites a “book-length report” about the safety of GMOs. But there’s no mention of the many studies showing liver and kidney damage to animals. By manipulating data, the report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine smooths over GMO safety.

The problem is the use of glyphosate in GMO Roundup Ready corn, soy, cotton, canola, sugar beets and alfalfa. Their genes are injected with a dose of Agrobacterium (sounds delicious, right?) to withstand spraying with Roundup, a weed killer containing glyphosate.

According to numerous studies cited by the Organic Consumers Association, glyphosate has been shown to cause or contribute to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, Alzheimer’s disease, anencephaly (which causes children to be born without a major portion of the brain and skull) and other birth defects, autism, brain, breast, lung and prostate cancer, celiac and gluten intolerance, kidney disease, colitis, depression, diabetes, heart disease, hypothyroid, multiple sclerosis, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, Parkinson’s, pregnancy problems, obesity, reproductive problems and respiratory illnesses.

Farmers use more and more Roundup, as their crops become resistant. Tests show it persists for years, accumulating in human blood, urine, soil, almost all waterways and even in rain. One hundred sixty countries use over 1.4 billion pounds of this stuff each year.

By hiding the science and blaming hysterical Democrats for fretting, Monsanto has gotten away with poisoning us slowly since 1976.

Time for real testing, real science and real answers. Label GMOs and let us decide what we want to eat and how we want to spend our money.

Elizabeth Throckmorton Kellett

Walpole