What is WITH these FDA IDIOTS? Cloned animals okay to eat?
I wonder who paid payola to whom to get the FDA to give a preliminary thumbs up to cloned animals such as beef and goat, entering the food supply. The most disturbing part of this story is “For food that does come from clones, the Food and Drug Administration is unlikely to require labels, officials said.”
Now, as someone on /. pointed out, we found out the hard way that feeding sheep’s brains to cows was not a good idea, and resulted in Mad Cow Disease in cows and CJD, a fatal disease, in people who ate Mad Cow infected meat. So what is the end result of people eating the same genetic makeup of meat over and over and over? One slashdotter postulated this:
If millions of people effectively eat that same cow for decades, and it turns out there is something funny about it’s genetic makeup that has a knock on effect for even a small percentage of the population, then a lot of people could find themselves with some serious problems. It might be increase susceptibility to certain cancers, it could make people more prone to Alzheimer’s, it could be another neurological condition, we just don’t know, but we do know it can, and has happened before. And for what? To save a couple of pence on each hamburger sold (*literally*). Not worth going in for all guns blazing IMO.I’m not try to be melodramatic about it, but think about how many screwed up two-headed, six-legged or three tailed goats get created for every decent quality clone that goes in front of the camera and even the ‘good’ clones don’t last long - a clone is, in many ways, the age of the original PLUS it’s own age (never mind the other problems under the surface due to damaged DNA).
Yes, we all know where this is leading. Cost cutting Big Agribusiness is going to jump in with both feet, make sure the lobbyists and astroturf groups are ready to protect that FDA stance on the labelling requirement, and get that clone to market! So what if people don’t want it? And the response from almost anyone asked is that no, we don’t want cloned meat nor milk/dairy from cloned animals. The shame of it is, there’s a good chance there are already clones in the food supply, with only the farmers the wiser.
Technorati Tags: cloned beef, FDA, Big Agribusiness, milk from Cloned Cows
