--- begin forwarded text
Date: Mon, 01 May 2000 09:23:41 -0500
Subject: FW: NYTimes on G-E Atl Salmon
From: "Ericka " <[log in to unmask]>
To: "Rex B. - Sierra" <[log in to unmask]>, [log in to unmask],
"Janet & Ric" <[log in to unmask]>
X-Priority: 3
It's worth your time to go to the site and look at the illustrations
with this article.
Ericka
http://www.catnipfarm.com
--The Mighty Oak was once a little nut that held its ground.
----------
From: Nancy Oden <[log in to unmask]>
To: list suppressed <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: NYTimes on G-E Atl Salmon
Date: Mon, May 1, 2000, 8:57 AM
Hi people - Even now the regular caged Atl. Salmon eat 3-7 pounds of
people-edible fish to grow one pound of marketable fish for human
consumption. These monsters with growth hormone genes will outcompete
natural, wild fish for food when they escape (which many inevitably
will). And do we want to be eating creatures with enhanced growth
hormones? What will that do to us?
Call for a moratorium on all g-e life forms until we, the people of
Earth, discuss and decide whether or if they should be created and for
what reasons.
- Nancy Oden
http://www.nytimes.com/library/national/science/050100sci-gm-animal.html
May 1, 2000
Altered Salmon Lead the Way to the Dinner Plate, but Rules Lag
By CAROL KAESUK YOON
REDESIGNING NATURE
From Monday's Times Part two of this article
</library/national/science/050100sci-gm-animal2.html> .
If It Walks and Moos Like a Cow, Then It Must Be a Drug Factory
</library/national/science/050100sci-gm-animal2.html#moo>
Charts
Precocious Salmon </library/national/science/050100sci-gm-animal.2.jpg.html>
A Different Kind of Barnyard
</library/national/science/050100sci-gm-animal.3.jpg.html>
Related Articles
Issue in Depth: Genetic Modification Debate
</library/national/science/health/gm-index.html>
The New York Times on the Web: Science/Health
</yr/mo/day/national/index-science.html>
Forum
Join a Discussion on Genetically Engineered Food
<http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?13@@.f0a8abb>
ith quaint fishing villages dotting its shores and farming still one
of its mainstays, the pastoral landscape of Prince Edward Island
seems an unlikely place to encounter one of the most modern
creatures on earth. Yet it is in the tanks at Aqua Bounty Farms on
the island off New Brunswick, Canada, that hundreds of truly novel
fish swim: schools of genetically engineered salmon that await
approval for sale in the United States.
These fish look like Atlantic salmon found in groceries around the
world, but for their age they are enormous. Endowed with foreign
genes that produce growth hormones, they grow to market size -- about
seven pounds -- in 18 months, twice as fast as normal salmon.
Experts on the biotechnology industry predict that these fish will
be the first genetically modified animal to make it onto American
dinner plates, alongside genetically engineered vegetables like corn
and potatoes, which have been available for several years.
Elliot Entis, president of A/F Protein Inc., the biotech company
that owns Aqua Bounty Farms, said that the company already had
orders for 15 million eggs and would be ready to ship them next
year, should they receive federal approval. Approval is also being
sought to sell the fish in Canada.
A menagerie of other genetically modified animals is in the works,
promising what biotech backers say will be advantages like cheaper
and more nutritious food. Borrowing genes from various creatures and
implanting them in others, scientists are creating fast-growing trout
and catfish, oysters that can withstand viruses, and an "Enviropig,"
whose feces are less harmful to the environment because they contain
less phosphorus.
Scientists are also developing a pig that makes a leaner pork chop,
one of the first genetically modified animals that would offer direct
benefits to consumers and something biotech advocates hope will make
the marketing of genetically modified foods easier.
Mr. Entis and colleagues describe their fast-growing fish as part of
a blue revolution in aquaculture that could feed more people more
efficiently and more cheaply.
But critics and even some Clinton administration officials say that
genetically engineered creatures are threatening to slip through a
net of federal regulations that has surprisingly large holes.
While food safety issues should be addressed, some scientists say,
the bigger concern is the environmental threats posed by genetically
modified animals like the salmon. For example, a recent study showed
that populations of wild fish could, in theory, be wiped out by
mating with certain kinds of genetically engineered fish, should they
escape. In addition, there is the possibility of unpredictable
environmental disruptions, like those that occur when non-native
species invade ecosystems, as the zebra mussels have the Hudson River.
Yet United States regulators interviewed could not point to any
federal laws specifically governing the use or release of
genetically engineered animals.
"This is a very big hole," said Dr. Rebecca Goldburg, senior
scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund, a group that has been
highly critical of the biotech industry and the federal regulators.
"There's nothing clearly on the books. There are no regulations about
what you can and can't do."
A/F Protein
Genetically altered salmon, right, and their puny siblings, at 14 months.
Instead, federal agencies seeking to regulate genetically
engineered organisms are stretching regulations written for other
purposes to what critics describe as surprising lengths.
So far, for example, only the Food and Drug Administration appears
to have any authority over the new salmon, which the agency claimed
by designating the fish's foreign genes and the growth hormone they
produce as a drug for animals.
The Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of
Agriculture, the two other agencies overseeing genetically modified
organisms, have bowed out of the salmon case, a decision that many
with an interest in the issue regret. The F.D.A. is likely to be
rigorous in examining food safety, these critics say, but the agency
is less experienced in reviewing environmental risks.
"The F.D.A. is not qualified to evaluate the ecological risks of
engineered fish," said Dr. Jane Rissler, senior staff scientist at
the Union of Concerned Scientists, a watchdog group that is a
longtime critic of biotech regulation. "We should be concerned that
the environment will be at risk."
John Matheson, senior regulatory review scientist at the Food and
Drug Administration's Center for Veterinary Medicine, defended the
agency's ability to conduct environmental reviews, saying that it
routinely investigates the environmental impact of new drugs.
"We look at the environmental impacts of approving an antibiotic, how
much is released into the environment, what does it do," Mr. Matheson
said. "I don't have any more discomfort about this than reviewing
other animal drugs for environmental impacts."
Yet other administration officials said increasing concern over the
handling of ecological risks by the three federal agencies that
monitor biotech organisms had prompted consideration of a review of
the current regulatory framework.
"We need a system that lets us check things beforehand, that shifts
the burden of proof onto those that would introduce them," said Dr.
William Brown, science adviser to the secretary of the Department of
the Interior. "I don't think the potential impacts on nature have
been thought through as well as they should be."
FOOD SAFETY
Agency Cites Low Levels of Growth Hormone
r. Choy Hew and Dr. Garth Fletcher were among the first researchers
to genetically engineer fish when they inserted two foreign genes
into Atlantic salmon in 1989. One gene, taken from a chinook salmon,
produces growth hormone. A second gene, taken from an ocean pout, a
distant relative of salmon, functions to keep the first gene
constantly producing its hormone.
Finally, last year, after a decade of genetic tinkering, researchers
had a reliable breeding stock of salmon that could grow up to six
times faster than normal.
Company officials are quick to point out that the new fish produces
no more growth hormone than normal salmon. The reason the fish grows
faster, Dr. Fletcher said, is that the fish produces the hormone
year-round, unlike normal salmon, which produce it only in
warm-weather months.
In fact, levels of growth hormone in the fish are so low, Mr.
Matheson said, that the Food and Drug Administration will not require
one particular set of tests -- feeding the salmon to rodents --
that are typical for new drugs for animals.
"You can't choke rats with enough salmon to cause an effect other
than choking," he said. Some scientists not involved with the company
also pointed out that fish growth hormone was unlikely to have an
effect on humans.
The salmon do not even grow to be unusually large, Dr. Fletcher
said, as even 7-year-old salmon at AquAdvantage have never weighed
more than 17 pounds, large but far from record-breaking for the
species.
Mr. Entis also said that the new fish taste just like other salmon
grown on farms.
Some scientists not involved with the company also played down food
safety concerns but said it would be important to know, for example,
if the foreign growth hormone triggered increased production of other
compounds, like insulinlike growth factors. Mr. Entis of A/F Protein
said the company had been asked to look into that question and others
as part of the continuing Food and Drug Administration review.
Continue to Part Two </library/national/science/050100sci-gm-animal2.html>
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