FDA: Cloned animals safe to eat
After years of delay, the Food and Drug Administration tentatively concluded yesterday that milk and meat from some cloned farm animals are safe to eat. That finding could make the United States the first country to allow products from cloned livestock to be sold in grocery stores.
Even if the agency’s assessment is formally approved next year, consumers will not see many steaks or pork chops from cloned animals because the technology is still too expensive to be used widely.
But the F.D.A.’s draft policy touched off an immediate storm of criticism from consumer groups, as well as some concerns from meat and dairy companies worried about consumer reaction.
“At the end of the day, F.D.A. is looking out for a few cloning companies and not for consumers or the dairy industry,” said Joseph Mendelson, legal director for the Center for Food Safety, an advocacy group.
Mr. Mendelson and other consumer representatives argue that the science backing the F.D.A.’s decision is shaky and that consumer surveys show that most people are opposed to cloning animals, let alone eating them. Some also said that cloning causes harm to the animals involved and could pave the way for human cloning.
Opponents hope to bring Congressional pressure to bear to derail the policy before it becomes final or at least to require that such foods be labeled so consumers can choose to avoid them. F.D.A. officials said that it was unlikely that labeling would be required because food from cloned animals is indistinguishable from other food, although a final decision about labeling has not been made.
Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, yesterday called for a “careful, deliberative and open process” before cloned animals are approved for food.
The F.D.A.’s finding comes more than six years after the agency first decided to study the matter, after recognizing that the advent of cloned farm animals raised a food safety issue. After that study, the agency in 2003 gave a tentative approval to cloned animals for food. But the F.D.A. retreated after its own advisory panel found there was insufficient scientific backing for that conclusion.
This time, F.D.A. officials said they had substantial new data, which they presented yesterday in a nearly 700-page “draft risk assessment.”
The officials denied the contention from some critics that the policy was announced during a holiday week in order to reduce publicity, saying it had taken until now to analyze the data and obtain comment from other government agencies.
The assessment concluded that milk and meat from cloned cows, pigs and goats, and from their offspring, were “as safe to eat as the food we eat every day,” Stephen F. Sundlof, the F.D.A.’s chief of veterinary medicine, said in a telephone call with reporters.
Mr. Sundlof said that by law the agency could consider only the scientific issues, not consumer demand or the ethics of cloning.
While animal cloning has always been legal, since 2001 there has been a voluntary moratorium on the sales of milk or meat from such animals to give the F.D.A. time to study the matter. Some experts say that some products from clones or their offspring have probably nonetheless made their way into the food supply.
The moratorium will stay in place until the new policy is completed, after a 90-day period for public comment and additional time for the F.D.A. to review the comments. Mr. Sundlof said he could not say when the final policy would be ready, though it might be by the end of 2007.
nytimes
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