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01/23/2007: "CLONED FOOD"

As 2006 came to a close the Food and Drug Administration approved cloned animal products as safe to consume. Stephen F. Sundlof, DVM, PhD, director of the FDA's Center for Veterinary Medicine, announced the FDA's findings at a press conference December 28, 2006. Following suit of the FDA's backwards labeling requirements, no labeling fees or requirements are suggested for foods made from cloned animals. Milk and hamburgers made with cloned DNA will sit side-by-side with natural and factory farmed foods. Senator Carole Migden (D-San Francisco), introduced legislation this week that would require clear labeling of food products derived from cloned animals.

There are so many hot topics related with this headline, it's hard to begin wrapping one's mind around it. First, there are health issues. The first cloned animal lived just over half it's average lifespan. Dolly, the cloned sheep born in 1996 suffered from arthritis and lung disease usually seen in much older animals. This animal was put down after living only 6 years. If newborns are fragile and more susceptible to disease, how vulnerable are cloned animal cells? Cloning is still more natural than genetic engineering. Although the animal is conceived synthetically, it's DNA structure is identical to it's source. Genetic engineering, however, introduces new strains of DNA to the food chain. But that's a different rant.

Because cloning an animal is expensive at $20,000, the practice may be limited to breeders of elite animals. These animals do enter the food supply, but not frequently. Perhaps the most pressing issues I can introduce, have nothing to do with health risks. They have to do with "rights". Something a free society should be concered with. It is obvious that our laws do not grant animals equal rights as humans. They can be imprisoned, forced to do labor and killed legally. Practices that were inflicted on humans just over a hundred years ago. But now, on top of that, animals have lost the right to reproduce naturally. Which overlaps the conflict of a woman's right to choose. I have no idea what it is like to be a woman, but cloning would send me to the streets. Allowing men to reproduce an animal without it's consent while denying a woman the choice not to reproduce, sends off signs of oppression at the core of life itself.

The right to live, die and reproduce are liberties granted to all living things by the Creator (God). Our interpretation and adaptation of these liberties will be a major factor in shaping our future society. We need to talk about these issues from different perspectives and the hypocrisies that result from our policies or lack of thereof.