Crabbage
Why don’t more people have a problem with this?
Being a scientist I am all for scientific advancement, but only when the research is done ethically and rigorously. I am not against cloning. I am against the fact that food from a cloned animal will not be labelled. As a result, the FDA does not allow the consumer to make a choice. The FDA doesn’t want consumers to make a choice because it means that the public would then ask questions and would be educated enough to choose against cloned food products.
Why could it be unsafe to eat cloned foods? No one really knows- only time will tell. But that’s the point. These studies th FDA has done are only a litle over 5 years long. 5 years is not enough time to understand the consequences of introducing new factors into the enviroment. Not only does the cloned food need to examined over longer periods of time, but it needs to be investigated in different age groups.Think about a child and how quickly they grow- their diet affects how they grow much more than it does to an adult. But also as an adult, a 20 year old is completely different from a 40 year old which is vastly different from an 80 year old person- different metabolisms, health problems, etc need to be considered with the differing age groups.
The FDA states that there is no difference in the food from clones and food from other animals. But at the same time the FDA is ignoring research that shows cloning results in more deaths and deformed animals than other reproductive technologies. This clearly states that we don’t understand the process of cloning completely. It is not as simple as replacing the DNA of the donor egg with the DNA of choice- something must be happening that scientists don’t understand to result in death and deformity in cloned animals.
Farmers want to replicate animals because they can make copies of exceptional animals, like pigs that fatten rapidly or cows that are superior milk producers.The FDA states that it’s not a genetically engineered animal because no genes have been changed or moved or deleted. But cloning doesn’t guarantee an exact replicate of the original animal- it only promises and exact replicate of the genetic code. It dosen’t take into account enviromental factors (the physical naure around it, the diet, the way the organism is brought up, etc)- there are many many factors that will contribute to the expression of that genetic code. It is the same reason identical twins can have completly different health problems, personalities, strenghs and weaknesses, etc. So this means that just because the original cow they decided to genetically copy is healthy, it does not promise that the replicate will be healthy. Then what happens when you end up with herds of cows that have been replicated? Now they are more susceptible to disease because they are genetically identical. The risks go on and on and suggests more studies need to be done.
So what am I trying to say with all this? Science has not figured out all the answers. Science has helped us have more food available, but it has also lowered the quality and nutrition in our food. Nature is unpredictable and we can not predict the outcomes with short term studies. Ask questions about your food- where it came from, how it was grown, and think about how you feel when you eat it. Demand foods be labelled- you should have a choice. If you want to eat cloned foods, that is fine, but if you want to stay away fom this, eat organically as much as you can- especially when it comes to dairy products and meats. Take control of your own life by knowing what you put into your body- don’t let the FDA make that choice for you.
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