For technical reasons, some of the gene modification techniques used the presence of antibiotic resistance properties in the modified plants as a way of identifying them. That has given rise to concern about the possibility of such resistance being transferred to human pathogens, a scare much used by anti-GM campaigners.

The risk is minute and comes not from GM crops but from the misuse of antibiotics in medicine, especially in some countries: they are prescribed too liberally (or available without prescription) and people often fail to finish the course of treatment because they feel better. That gives a chance for resistance to arise if the pathogenic bacteria have not been completely eliminated.

Pathologists think that the existing level of antibiotic resistance is already so high that it would not even be possible to detect any effect in a patient of genetic transfer from the consumption of a GM food containing a resistance marker. In New Zealand, which has no commercial GM production and does not use GM foods, some 40% of soil bacteria were found to be resistant to penicillin and 30% resistant to ampicillin.

It is extremely unlikely that the ampicillin resistance gene or other novel genetic material will transfer from foods derived from DBT418 corn to bacteria or other cells in the human digestive tract because of the number and complexity of steps that would need to take place consecutively. In the highly unlikely event that the resistance gene was transferred the human health impacts would be negligible because ampicillin-resistant bacteria are already commonly found in the human gut and in the environment.

Source:

Food derived from insect-protected and glufosinate ammonium-tolerant dbt418 corn – A Safety Assessment. Technical Report Series No. 18. Food Standards Australia New Zealand (June 2003), page 18 (http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/ _srcfiles/A380%20DBT418%20corn.doc)

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