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Tonya
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 3726
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, December 28, 2006 - 06:57 pm: | 
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Food from cloned animals safe to eat: FDA
Thu Dec 28, 2006 8:19 PM GMT
By Missy Ryan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Milk and meat from some cloned animals are safe to eat, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Thursday in a draft ruling that brings the controversial technology closer to American grocery carts.
If given final approval, the ruling would allow for the sale of food made from cloned cattle, pigs and goats, but not sheep, in the United States for the first time.
The agency said it would be unlikely to recommend special labels for food made from clones, which are genetic twins of donor animals, but would not decide on the labeling issue until it collects comments from the public over the next 90 days.
"No unique risks for human food consumption were identified in cattle, swine or goat clones," it said.
The FDA did not have enough evidence to give the same assurance on sheep clones, but it did vouch for food made from clones' offspring, which many believe would account for most of the clone-related food making its way onto dinner tables.
Making clones of animals works by taking cells from an adult and fusing them with other cells before implanting them in a surrogate mother. A relatively small amount of cloned livestock now exists in the United States.
The FDA stressed it will maintain its current moratorium on the food until a final ruling is issued.
"This does not end the agency's review of cloning. We view this as the beginning of the agency's interaction with the public on this issue," Stephen Sundlof, an FDA veterinarian, said in a conference call with reporters.
Comments will be accepted until April 2 but there was no word on when a final ruling would be made.
MANY CONSUMERS NOT CONVINCED
Advocates of livestock cloning hope the technology will help produce more milk and lean, tender meat by creating more disease-resistant animals. They insist it is perfectly safe and hope shoppers will believe that as they learn more.
But some consumer and religious groups strongly oppose the idea, arguing that scientists do not know enough about the effects of cloning on nutrition or biology. They also want more time for public debate on the ethics of cloning.
The issue could make waves for exporters of U.S. farm goods, who have run into problems when prohibited genetically engineered crops made their way into the food supply.
Opinion polls suggest shoppers would be wary. More than half of consumers in a recent survey by the International Food Information Council said they were unlikely to buy food made from cloned animals, no matter what the government says.
"It's important that FDA is the barometer for making decisions on the basis of safety, health and nutrition," said Dave Schmidt, the council's president. "Then it's essentially how the marketplace will react."
While affected industries welcomed government reassurances about food safety, they remain keenly aware that supermarket decisions of consumers keep them in business.
"FDA should be cautious about allowing meat and milk from cloned animals to be introduced into the marketplace if most consumers are unwilling to accept the technology," the American Meat Institute said in a statement.
Cost is another factor.
"Cloning, I would think, would be too expensive for it to compete in the mainstream marketplace," said Len Steiner, owner of Steiner Consulting Group, a food industry consultancy.
Groups like the Consumer Federation of America called the FDA's step premature, saying it has not sufficiently vetted the technology's safety or ethical and religious issues.
"All those concerns are really being swept under the rug," said Joe Mendelson, legal director at the Center for Food Safety, which opposes some biotechnology.
(Additional reporting by Susan Heavey in Washington and Bob Burgdorfer in Chicago)
© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved. | Learn more about Reuters
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=healthNews&storyID=2006-12 -28T201918Z_01_WBT006349_RTRIDST_0_HEALTH-CLONING-FOOD-DC.XML&pageNumber=0&image id=&cap=&sz=13&WTModLoc=NewsArt-C1-ArticlePage2 |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2590
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, December 28, 2006 - 07:52 pm: |
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Soylent Green. Coming to a grocer near you and sooner than you think. |
Yvettep
Veteran Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 1508
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, December 28, 2006 - 08:02 pm: |
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Anyone read Michael Crichton's latest? |
Enchanted
Regular Poster
Username: Enchanted
Post Number: 331
Registered: 11-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 02:13 am: |
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I am not about to eat no cloned animals I barely like eating the real ones!
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Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 7226
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 07:32 am: |
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Tonya,
Our food supply is already so polluted and doped up that it probably doesn't much matter whether we cloned ribs and chicken wings.
Yvettep,
No I have not, though I saw Crichton talk about it on BookTV about a month ago. Crichton's a prolific writer of popular fiction. But he's NOT much of a public speaker.
Enchanted,
I think cloned animal would, techically, still be considered "real". No perhaps ORIGINAL ones. But still REAL ones. |
Dahomeyahosi
Regular Poster
Username: Dahomeyahosi
Post Number: 112
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 10:11 am: |
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I will stick with organic and hope they don't allow cloned animals into the supply. |
Chrishayden
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 3203
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 12:26 pm: |
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Yvettep:
I read it and I urge everybody else to. I like it better than anything he has written before and I think it is on the level of Catch 22, Dr. Strangelove or the movie Network.
All:
I am a committed meateater. From what I have heard about the utter corruption in the FDA and the sloppiness of testing I will go vegetarian if they start doing this and urge everybody else to.
They don't give a damn about us they are just trying to shove their poison down our throats.
NO CLONED FOODS! |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2598
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 12:35 pm: |
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Get real Chris. You know you'll eat anything 
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Yvettep
Veteran Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 1517
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 12:36 pm: |
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Thanks, Chris, for the recommendation. It is next on my list, as I just finished "Hannibal Rising." |
Chrishayden
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 3209
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 01:34 pm: |
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Next by Michael Crichton
I struggled to get started with it at first but once I got going I couldn't put it down. I read it all of one day over the Xmas holidays, putting myself in a head spinning spell.
The Good Doctor obviously wrote this book with an awareness of its chances of being filmed and filled it with outrageous coincidences
and plot holes--
But it does not matter.
I liked this book better than any other he has written--it took the subjects of Jurassic Park and the Lost World (genetic engineering)
and took them from a Monster on the Loose story to the level of great satires such as Catch 22, Dr. Strangelove, Brave New World, Network,
and others.
Though farfetched some of these things could be happening right now,and some of them really are.
Characters you will meet: a talking organgutan, a genius, parrot, a hybrid of a human and a chimpanzee, tissue thieves and grave robbers,
gene stealing ventgure capitalists, Image and publicity crazed "scientists", organ bounty hunters.
In the fiction is truth about what science is becoming in the 21st Century, some sort of Frankenstein meets What Makes Sammy Run where
the latest theories are decided and announced in the tabloids
At the end he makes several proposals which you consider seriously
Stop patenting genes
Establish clear guidelines for the use of human tissues
Pass laws to ensure that data about gene testing is made public
Avoid bans on research
Rescind the Bay-Dole Act
This is a must read--what all great science fiction has done--made you think about the real and actual world and how scientific
developments affect our future
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Satina
Newbie Poster
Username: Satina
Post Number: 39
Registered: 05-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 01:34 pm: |
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My question is: how the hell would ya know if you're eating cloned meat anyway??? Like, are they going to have a seal on it? A cloned stamp date?? That's why I'm well on my way to becoming a vegetarian. Gave up pork and beef so far, and chicken's next. You just cannot trust what's in the meat these days. Btw, has anyone read the Rolling Stone article last month? The issue with Snoop Dog on the cover? They had a really good article about the pork industry. If you don't read that article and think twice about what you eat,- there's no help for you. |
Chrishayden
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 3211
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 01:42 pm: |
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Satina:
Up to now you are fairly certain you haven't been eating it.
After the FDA makes its ruling you won't know.
I could live with the idea of being poisoned to death, at least my survivors would get something out of it. I won't take the chance of ingesting something that will make me a vegetable or consign me to a long agonizing slow death. |
Chrishayden
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 3212
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 01:44 pm: |
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Though it is fiction, in the book these scientists have isolated a so called maturity gene which makes baby mice act older.
People accidentally get it and they start acting responsible for a change.
Then they start aging and dying prematurely.
Of course you say its fiction but right now they don't know--cloned animals have had shorter life spans than non cloned ones. |
Satina
Newbie Poster
Username: Satina
Post Number: 40
Registered: 05-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 01:53 pm: |
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That's what I'm saying Chris - you just don't know. That's what's scarry! |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 6306
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 02:16 pm: |
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What next? Will Cannibals be eating cloned humans? |
Enchanted
Regular Poster
Username: Enchanted
Post Number: 339
Registered: 11-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, December 29, 2006 - 03:35 pm: |
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LMAO@Cynique cannibals eating cloned humans.
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Toubobie
Regular Poster
Username: Toubobie
Post Number: 119
Registered: 08-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, December 30, 2006 - 09:37 am: |
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...and that includes animal bi-products, milk, cheese, eggs, etc....
Does anyone know how Halal and Kosher stores obtain their animals prepped for consumption? Do they raise and slaughter the animals or do they just slaughter them in accoradance with Islamic/ Judaic religious laws? I believe they must monitor what the animals themselves are fed, is that right?
Not everyone's physiology can tolerate a strictly vegetarian diet. Some folks thrive off of meat consumption. |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2638
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, December 30, 2006 - 10:31 am: |
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Face it people. Our food supply is contaminated and our bodies are full of harmful chemicals. Even if we don't eat the cloned meat, the vegetables are genetically altered also. And full of pesticides and growth enhancing fertilizers.
However, we must reduce our dependence upon meat. If the land that is used to produce food for the animals that we consume, were used to grow organic soy products and other healthy nutritious vegetables, we could eliminate world hunger and improve the quality of all of our lives.
We need to make this happen before it is too late!
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