Figwort mosaic virus (FMV) and Agrobacterium tumefaciens are phytopathogens meaning they specifically infect plants but not humans and animals.   Escherichia coli is a gram negative bacteria and the specific strain used is non-pathogenic belonging to the K12 derived used in DNA cloning and vector construction.
The CP4 EPSPS protein was obtained from the naturally occurring soil-borne plant-symbiotic bacterium Agrobacterium sp. strain CP4. The possibility that the CP4 EPSPS protein would be an allergen in sugar beet lines containing event H7-1 was considered unlikely. This was based on the negligible amount of protein in edible parts of the sugar beet plant, the lack of sequence homology between CP4 EPSPS protein and known allergens, and CP4 EPSPS protein's likely digestion in simulated gastric and intestinal fluids. The results combined with the absence of CP4 EPSPS protein detected in refined sugar suggests that sugar derived from sugar beet lines containing event H7-1 would not pose any greater allergenic risk than non-transgenic sugar beet sugar.Food derived from sugar beet line H7-1 is equivalent to that derived from current commercial varieties of sugar beet in terms of its safety for human consumption.