On Monday evening, after two days of hearings, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration concluded "that they do not yet have sufficient data to determine that a genetic modification that enables salmon to grow twice as quickly is safe for the affected fish or for consumers," according to ABC News.
The salmon in question, a product called AquAdvantage, have been genetically altered to contain a growth hormone gene from the Chinook salmon and a genetic switch from the ocean pout that turns on an antifreeze gene. The Atlantic salmon, which would be raised on farms, contain an extra growth hormone gene that allows them to grow to marketable size about twice as fast as conventional fish, enabling fisheries to increase profitability and bring salmon to market in 18 months versus the traditional 30 months.
Now the genetic manipulation and modification of our food supply isn't entirely new. This food technology which manipulates the DNA and engineers profitable characteristics and traits into food was introduced into our food supply about fifteen years ago. But it hasn't gotten a whole lot of attention in the U.S. media despite its controversial introduction in 1994, when scientists began engineering new traits into corn, milk and soy, enabling corporations to patent this newly licensed technology and the food supply, driving shareholder value and profitability.
And now, with the insertion of an "on switch" gene into the DNA of salmon, scientists at a company called AquaBounty Technologies have modified and patented the genetic makeup of salmon and engineered fish to eat year round so that it can grow twice as fast. As a result, salmon producers will be able to grow salmon more quickly, driving profitability and capitalizing on the growing demand for fish.
Approval of the salmon could pave the way for other such biotech animals to enter the food supply while no long-term human studies have been conducted to assess what the long-term health implications might be for humans. Because of a regulatory decision in the 1980s that no new laws are needed to regulate genetically engineered foods, the FDA is actually regulating the GE salmon as a drug.
"I do get heartburn when we're going to allow post-market surveillance to finalize our safety evaluation," said one committee member, Michael D. Apley, a pharmacology expert at Kansas State University, according to the New York Times.
According to the New York Times, "Ronald L. Stotish, the chief executive of AquaBounty Technologies, the company that developed the salmon, told the FDA committee that his company's salmon, known as AquAdvantage, would help the world meet rising demand for seafood without further devastating natural fisheries. Addressing environmental concerns over these fish escaping into wild salmon populations, AquaBounty Technologies shared that their intellectual property will be protected because the fish will be sterile, as they will all be triploids (fish with three complete sets of chromosomes instead of the usual two) and the company's patented and commercialized fish will all be females, making them unable to breed."
FDA committee members did not point out anything about the fish that would seem dangerous, relying on data funded and conducted by AquaBounty Technology, despite one study suggesting a possible increase in the potential to cause allergic reactions. The test showed a possible increase in the potential to cause allergic reactions that was almost statistically significant even though only six fish were used in each group in the study. In its allergenicity studies submitted to the FDA, AquaBounty converted its data into an undefined estimated measure it called "relative potency," a term the lab was unable to define when asked by the FDA.
With a fair amount of controversy around the allergenicity associated with this new technology (which created tension back in 2002 at a government meeting of the Food Biotechnology Subcommittee of the Food Advisory Committee in which the committee's acting chair, Edward N. Brandt, Jr., MD, PhD, said "Of course, we haven't worked into this some kind of test for allergencity, per se... "), the 1994 introduction of the genetic modification of our food supply, without accompanying labels alerting consumers of its presence, prompted an almost allergic reaction from renowned allergist, Dr. Fred McDaniel Atkins, who said, "To me, the logical problem is that we are going to take that stuff and feed it to the public without their informed consent."
At the same time, other nationally recognized allergists have remained relatively quiet regarding the allergenicity of genetically modified foods and some have invented patents for companies, like AquaBounty, that are responsible for the patenting and genetic modification of our food.
And while missing data appears not to bother some experts, including one of the FDA panel members who stated that "the salmon contains nothing that isn't in the human diet," Dr. Atkins' concerns over the allergenicity and long-term health implications of genetically modified foods are shared by others.
"We are missing data," said panel member James McKean, a professor at Iowa State University. He said that "leaves a cloud" over the FDA staff's analysis.
The FDA will hold its next public hearing Tuesday, September 21, 2010, as it considers whether to label the salmon as genetically modified. If approval does go through, the first genetically modified salmon could begin entering U.S. supermarkets within about two years, upon which the FDA will be relying on market surveillance measures similar to those currently being used by the egg and beef industry to assess post-market health implications.
Editor's note: An earlier version of this post stated that an 11-person panel consulted on the issue of GM salmon was composed of FDA employees. In fact, they were outside experts. Also, the headline stated that the science was 'unsatisfactory,' when in fact a more appropriate categorization is that it is inconclusive.
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Mark Hyman, MD: Wild? Farmed? What Fish Should We Eat?
The sad comment that the data is "inconclusive" is a euphemism for "I want to be sure I have a job with the GMO lobby when I rotate out of the FDA or USDA". The majority of the folks running and creating policy in the USDA & FDA came from the big food industry. Most will return to it when they are done gerrymandering the idea of safe food to include that which is completely untested, of in this case an n=6. Statistically this is a non-entity and should be laughed out of the room. Instead we are being told that the data is inconclusive. It is also good to recall that the industry is allowed to do their testing secretly and not provide any information to the public about the methodology, the cohort, the data or the actual conclusions. We are supposed to trust these folks, who want to own all sources of food production through patents, to tell us the truth about the newest salvation for humanity from which they stand to make billions (literally). Since when can we trust greed?
It should be noted that big AG and farm pays large salaries to their advisory board of sell-out scientists to question and create controversy over any data that reflects poorly on them, no matter how well researched. So the common term is that any research questioning their opinion is "controversial".
Why is it so rare that we can't see one of these -- fish farming -- solves the other?
When Target or another store agrees to only sell wild caught fish, they are basically agreeing to further reduce the populations of fish that are already low. Or is the plan to continuously raise prices for wild-caught fish so consumption goes down and only high-income people can afford to buy it?
We've got to get beyond this idea that farmed fish (or farmed anything) is bad/evil/controlled by corporations and so on. Perhaps salmon from AquAdvantage isn't the way to go -- but maybe it is. In the end, the marketplace can decide.
And who knows, maybe 10 or 20 years down the road we'll come to realize that adopting technology and food production methods that result in more food with less harm to the environment is the best best choice.
"Maybe it's safe" is not good enough for me. This is the food supply. This is the earth and all its species, including the human species.
OF COURSE the company is not interested in doing rigorous studies of its product. Why are they even allowed to be in control of the studies used for regulatory approvel? Such studies should be done independently.
"The test showed a possible increase in the potential to cause allergic reactions that was almost statistically significant even though only six fish were used in each group in the study. "
Let's preserve our Oceans and Salmon Runs. We can do it. This idea is sickly cynical.
That's my body telling me "stay away."
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/22/us/politics/22mining.html?_r=1
A source of certified sustainable fisheries that is recommended by numerous physicians:
http://www.vitalchoice.com/index.cfm
It must have been like what we see in this post by Robyn O'Brien, who has a long list of reasons to justify her unwillingness to make even the slightest compromise when it comes to filling her belly. We've devastated most wild salmon stocks from overfishing. Only remote Alaska has a semblance of a wild population left, but we'll eat it all eventually.
The magnificent bluefin tuna will go extinct sometime in the next decade. Fish that were once plentiful - from cod and halibut to swordfish and steelhead trout - are either gone or so rare that only the most affluent can afford them. The species this GMO fish was intended to save - the chinook salmon - has all but vanished. Blocking this version of farmed chinook helps guarantee that the species will disappear completely.
Clearly, however, we pampered Americans are fully in the grip of Easter Island Syndrome. So let's just pretend that something will somehow change and some unforeseen action will somehow save the few remaining wild fish.
Don't let worries about the death of the oceans interfere with your appetite. Just keep doing things the way we've always done them, and expect a different result.
Are you trying to argue that using this GM salmon is equivalent to man-made ecological disasters like Easter island, or that NOT using this fish is equivalent to such disasters?
The point of the fish, after all, is to create a sustainable population of farmed fish, that can be brought to market more quickly, which will hopefully reduce the demand for wild caught fish.
Robyn O'Brien is arguing that we stick with the old technology, which involves fishing salmon until they go extinct. According to a study published in SCIENCE, 90 percent of ocean species will be extinct by the year 2048. Folks like O'Brien want us to stay the course, doing nothing to stop this ongoing catastrophe.
I re-read my comment. In retrospect, it still seems pretty obvious to me.
This technology provides a much-needed way to produce food sustainably. Alas, the only thing most westerners care about is feeding themselves, no matter how much environmental damage is done in the process.
This technology provides salmon without threatening the dwindling population of wild salmon. It takes less energy, produces fewer carbon emission, emits less pollution, and damages less habitat.
Obviously, this is much more sustainable than killing the fish that are clinging to life in the damaged, overfished habitats that remain. You can increase fish harvests by simply growing more fish instead of wrecking more wild populations.
Take for example the grazing system set up by Joel Salatin (featured in Michael Pollan's 'The Omnivores Dilemma'): Joel uses a rotational pattern or cows grazing on grass, chickens eating on grazed grass, and a plot of grass that grows back, as a sustainable method of raising beef, poultry, and eggs. This is a "sustainable" method, but one could easily argue that this is not a "self-sustaining" system (like an ocean is a self-sustaining ecology), because without humans there to move the cows and chickens, the land might quickly become barren and unusable, like it was when the Salatin family found it.
This is a "sustainable" system because it can be sustained, even though it requires human interaction, just like all other farming systems do.
Lastly, what are you talking about with the "T4-Thyroid levels"? (I'm ignorant of this subject)
http://www.votingbloc.org/Food_Bloc.php
It is getting harder to find real food as time goes by.
Fish that are farmed using tanks or inland ponds with closed recirculating pump systems are much more sustainable, and several species farmed in this manner are recommended by the Monterrey Bay Aquarium and other ecological advocacy groups.
If you're going to hate on fish farming, you should at least have an understanding that transcends the most superficial kind of alarmism. Farmed salmon is unsustainable and ecologically harmful, but it's important to understand why this kind of farming is so undesirable.
I did know about the sea lice and dangers of infecting others.
Guess I had a Senior Moment about the tanks.
Thanks. I do hate fish farming. As I said, it is getting harder to find real food. GMO stuff. Farmed fish... who the hell would have ever thought fish would be farmed? Stocking lakes is one thing; producing salmon with the genes of Ocean Palp is quite another.