The Food and Drug Administration has declared meat and milk from cloned animals and their offspring to be “as safe as food we eat every day,†in the words of Stephen Sundloff, FDA’s food safety chief. The FDA believes that more study and mandatory labeling are unnecessary, even though Congress has been working on legislation to keep clones out of the food chain. So whenever the voluntary sales moratorium ends, will consumers have to just trust the FDA and industry that the cloned food they won’t realize their eating is safe? One problem is the context: The phrase “FDA-approved†seems more like a warning than an assurance these days.
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28 Comments
Since Bush seems to think is is fine for China to poison our children and for polluters to poison our air, why would he not think it is OK to poison our food? We don’t know what the long term effects of eating cloned animals is. I am not saying to ban it but consumers should be given a CHOICE as to whether to buy it or not. It should be labeled as having come from a cloned animal.
This will be the end of organic growers and whole food nutrition:
http://www.codexalimentarius.net/web/index_en.jsp
Remember kids, your government is YOU!!!!!!!!!!!
hahaha.
http://www.natural-health-information-centre.com/codex-alimentarius.html
Say bye-bye to any food not specifically approved by the World Health Org or minimally, the FDA. The WTO agreement pretty much lets these other countries decide what is “good for you”.
Truth sucks.
A real shame is the fact that we all (including myself) sit idle and watch this horror taking place without doing a damn thing. I feel really sick.
BKel
Sheesh, pass the cloned prime rib. Cloned animals are no more a threat than the cow raised in Kansas.
One more, the documentary, Nutricide:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5266884912495233634
If you care about your health (for real) and you have 40 minutes to just minimize it and listen, you ought to.
Stumper, you must be a biologist, show me studies, reports and proof that these are “perfectly safe” (pretty please) and I’ll eat them rare.
BTW,
They’ll allow this shite, but not stem cell research? Oh yeah, it’s cause we are the “superior” animal, “God’s choice”.
The talking heads told me this morning that companies that DO NOT use cloned meat may be able to label their food as clone free.
I just think the beef industry, as strong as it is will discourage that as it may impact some of their brethren.
Another thing that the talking heads informed me of is the quantity of gen-mod grains we eat every day. If you eat processed food that contains corn or soy, chances are that you are eating gen-mod grain. Isn’t that lovely?
Anyone know if flour – like gold medal or something, would be gen-mod free?
The Food and Drug Administration has declared meat and milk from cloned animals and their offspring to be “as safe as food we eat every day,”
I think that’s true. But sadly, it says more about the current food supply than it does cloned food.
We are already eating it. If you eat anything with grain, especially corn, you are already eating frankenfoods.
Eat fresh, eat local. Know your producer. If you buy the cheapest food at the store, you get what you pay for. No money? ANYONE can grow some food near their windowsill.
Support your local farmers, especially the real, non corporate, organic growers. The more you know about the commercial food supply, the more you will want to buy as local as possible.
This message brought to you by one of the FEW remaining farmers growing real food :)
All our foods are “gen/mod!! There is nothing in nature like corn, for example, it has been genetically modified by centuries of specialized breeding. Likewise broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage are all the same plant – the differences are selective breeding. Same for wheat, rice, etc., etc.
Your dog is a product of “gen/mod;” you’ll notice it no longer looks or acts like a wolf. And the cow you kill for your steak – likewise.
A clone is one thing, and one thing only: a genetic identical copy. Period. That means that if I have a really GOOD side of beef, I can reproduce it. Again and again. How is that bad?
You people need more to worry about.
I have to go with GMC on this one.
I don’t like the idea of cloned food, but from what I can tell, a clone is essential the same thing as an identical twin.
This happens naturally all the time.
Well GMC, you should feel free to eat LOTS of that food. I cant think of anyone I’d rather see eating it. Your choice indeed, and I encourage it for you.
repeat after me. government is good. government is right. big ag is my friend…
“government is good. government is right.”
Damn, didn’t that used to be the Democratic mantra? Now the mantra of the right.
Way to go GOP.
And you have the audacity to pot shot Ron Paul. If you did a second’s worth of research you would see just how far left the right has gone and that the only “classic” conservative is Ron Paul.
But hey GMC, keep pumping your tax dollar into big government. Keep supporting big government politicos. Atta boy GMC.
With the bush FDA they’ll probably clone cows infected with mad cow disease, butchered by illegal immigrants and wrapped in arsenic laced plastic.
It makes one want to swear off eating.
Well JR, at least you know how to grow your own food. Did you see someone else in Kansas died of CJ?
And the sheeple sleep…
KFG
Welcome back, BTW. And I love you too.
But you’re confusing two separate issues.
Is big ag “good” food? Sure, processed food is less good; full of additives, etc. No doubt that locally grown, organic food may be better, absent preservatives, additives, herbicides, etc. Try farming on a truly large scale that way, however. Feeding a planet that way is impossible. Organic, locally grown is a luxury you are afforded by your place in an affluent society. As can I. But it takes larger plots of land, and the willingness to lose more of the crop to weeds and pests; it’s less efficient.
You probably locally grow your corn, lettuce, broccoli, etc. You know, of course, that those locally grown organic veggies are the products of genetic modification through selective breeding. They are not at all “natural.” More healthy, perhaps. But not at all as God made them.
So as to your point that locally grown is better; true enough.
But that wasn’t the issue. Is cloned food any more dangerous because it’s cloned? No. It’s just identical. Pump it full of hormones and additives, and it’s no less “bad,” of course. But there is nothing inherent in cloning that makes the steak a bad steak. Man has been selectively breeding his livestock for centuries; there is nothing in nature like a Hereford or an Angus. Tell me the difference?
Fear of cloning, in this instance, is irrational fear. And as much as you and I disagree, I’ve always thought you a rational person (for the most part).
My problem with cloning of beef is with the cost and potential reduction in genetic diversity.
1)Cost, has got to be higher then breeding the old fashioned way, and to gain such a small marginal improvement in the final product.
Can we really clone Super Cows that have such a big noticeable difference in marbling or fat content or growth rate or disease resistance? Is the difference big enough that the average consumer will notice an improvement when grilling one T-bone vs another?
2)All the Libs love diversity in people. Guess what, for cows and other animals and plants, diversity is important for survivability. Say we finally breed THE PERFECT COW. It has perfect juicy, tender, and almost fat-free cuts of marvelous beef. (Ahhhh, hear the sizzle now!) We clone this Perfect Bessie and maybe get down to just 10 different breeds of cows.
Then some strange disease hits, and guess what? All the 10 remaining breeds are highly susceptible to this new strange disease and all our cows die.
Good for the pork, fish, and chicken business!
A cloned copy is the exact replica of the cloner. If the cow has genetic defects, they will show up in the cloned cow. If not, then there is no problem. I think some people watch too many sci-fi movies about the dead suckin’ brains. If I were a farmer, and had the “perfect” cow, I wouldn’t have a problem cloning her for market.
I do, however, take exception to the garbage cows are filled with in the name of healthier cows. Pumping cows full of chemicals to ward off disease makes for cows who don’t respond to normal drugs, and that can lead to spongy brains. Kinda like neo-cons.
I think the genetic market has a ways to go, but what they have achieved so far with corn less subject to disease and insects can do wonders for feeding a hungry world. Genetics ain’t the four horsemen many are trying to make it out to be. It can, and does, do real good in the world.
Actually GMC, small scale farming, organic or not, is more efficient in terms of production per acre than large scale farming.
And I agree, that I dont have as much of a problem with cloning as I do with poisoning the food we eat with chemicals and even organic pollution.
Purchasing fresh, locally grown food doesnt have to be more expensive. It just takes more investment of time to shop and cook. In fact, raw, whole foods are CHEAPER than processed foods across the board.
Google the productivity of small scale farms vs. large ag enterprises. I’m too lazy to look it up for you. Ditto with the cost of whole foods purchased locally. Look up Urban Harvest in Houston. I had the pleasure of visiting their offices, gardens and farmers markets while I was in Houston.
Besides, I’m busy marking up my seed cataloges right now…
Oh, and FYI, I’m selling my fresh brown eggs for $1.50 right now. Do you know the price of big ag eggs in the stores today?
I can buy fresh brown ORGANIC eggs at the farmers market in Austin for less than the white eggs at Costco.
Selective breeding is waaaaay different than genetic modification and gene splicing between species. Again, I’m too busy to look it up for you, but I fail to see how making corn “roundup ready” is good for human kind. It sucks up the water and has less nutrition.
And even when it was banned for human consumption, it still got into the food supply.
If you eat anything with corn, you are contributing to big irrigation and Monsanto. Not to mention your own poor health. Even the corn I grow here can get cross pollinated with my neighbor’s roundup ready junk.
And besides, you eat the cattle that eat the corn.
Eat fresh, eat local. And eat grass fed beef whenever possible.
Max actually made a very good point. You can breed or clone things too true.
I’d have to look into it further before I’d buy the stuff. I DO think we need better labeling in food.
But as long as bush and the deregulation crowd is in, I’d be uneasy about eating just about anything.
And yeah KFG I saw that story. I’m glad the media didn’t get wind when my Dad died. Though I would have taken the opportunity as I do here to again say be very concerned about mad cow disease in the food supply. We cannot be concerned enough in fact.
Seeing it first hand, I can tell you it is one horrible way to die.
I thought the color of the shell (brown or white) had to do with the breed of the chicken only. I know when I helped my grandfather candle eggs, they were a pain to grade as it was harder to see through the shell.
checks, undergrades (meatspots, bloodspots), rotten, etc.
Boring job to grade eggs, but I guess someone has to do it.
——-
Didn’t they narrow the cause of Mad Cow Disease to ground bone and tissue that was from diseased cows?
Haven’t heard that cloning would cause that particular disease.
Hey, it’s meat! Just exactly the same as the meat in the original cell donor. It’s not the meat that’s the problem, it’s the growing of it.
Cloning has been tried already, and it lead to one of the world’s great disasters. When the Spaniards came to Ireland back in the 16th century, they brought 5 potatos from Peru. Planting potatos from seed potatos is essentially cloning. By the 1840’s every potato in Ireland was a clone of one of those 5 originals. That’s nowhere near enough genetic diversity, so when the potato fungus came along, it finished off so many potatos that it caused a famine Ireland hasn’t fully recovered from yet.
The economics of cloning and genetic engineering will inevitably narrow the gene pool of food crops and livestock, leaving them fair game for whatever new disease comes down the pike. and it will hit the food supply harder at a time when we already can’t grow enough to adequately feed the population. Famine ain’t fun!
Good post Jed. That’s why I plant lots of heirlooms. Genetic diversity with NO gene splicing.
Come out here Jed… I’ll feed ya!
One of my best friends worked at Monsanto, and while she was bound by the company to not reveal anything about her genetic engineering experiments, she did tell me one thing.
“Yeah…cloned food. I just….I just…wouldn’t.”
Take that however you want.
Jed, ksfg – good points. Even without technical cloning we have incredibly narrowed the genetic diversity in many of our food sources – both plant and animal. It will be far too easy to have an infection that can wipe out whole populations – be it wheat, chickens, whatever.
I can understand the appeal of such narrow genetics for uniformity. However, a genetically mixed population is much healthier.