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February 18, 2004
Battling anti-biotechnology extremists
Ignorance and irrationality can be scientific progress's greatest foe. Henry Miller on fighting the good fight. Excerpt:
Significant advances in the fight against cancer, diabetes, AIDS, Parkinson's and numerous other diseases have relied on biotechnology. If future research were to lead to development of a product that provides significant relief, or even a life-saving cure, Measure H would prohibit its use in Mendocino County. That alone is reason enough to defeat this poorly-worded and confusing measure.California boasts a strong environmental movement, but by outlawing the cultivation of insect-resistant crops developed with the assistance of biotechnology, Measure H could lead to an increase in the levels of chemical pesticides in the area's ground and surface water (and would certainly cause increased occupational exposures).
Most important of all, Measure H would block sophisticated genetic approaches to the eradication of blights such as sudden oak death, phyloxera, powdery mildew and Pierce's Disease. ...
Like many Californians, I love the state's table grapes and wines, but California's vineyards are being threatened by Pierce's Disease, a bacterial infestation carried by an insect, the glassy-winged sharpshooter. Organic and conventional grape growers especially fear this devastating and lethal disease. Genetic improvement of grapevines may well prove to be the definitive solution to Pierce's Disease _ a solution that should not be denied to Mendocino County. The same applies to sudden oak death, which is destroying many of our glorious oak trees.
But there is a more important reason. I spent more than 15 years responsible for biotechnology regulatory policy at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. I personally evaluated the first biopharmaceuticals in the early 1980s. During that time, I was a crusader for imposing only the amount of regulation that was necessary and sufficient, and for regulatory approaches that made scientific and common sense. I was on the side of neither the activists nor the industry, and that remains true today. I am convinced that flawed public policy _ especially when it is as nonsensical as Mendocino County's Measure H _ makes a mockery of government and diminishes us all. I have written or edited five books and published more than 500 articles, many in peer-reviewed journals, on various aspects of regulation.
I am as much of an environmentalist as any of the people who have criticized me, but letting ideology and misguided activism trample science and common sense is not the route to sound public policy.
Freedom at work to shape one's own local environment and you slam it? And ideology (profit and the free market) and activism (corporate lobbying) in pro-biotechnology circles gets no mention? Unfortunately, they, the biotech proponents and activists, are cut from the same fundamentalist cloth.
What about the pro-biotechnology extremists in the face of scientific uncertainty of genetic release into the environment? no mention here? I am disappointed. Just because it is science doesn't mean it's rational and progressive (look at DDT, per our last conversation). Science in the service of business often has its own agenda that is not as rational as it seems.
ps. you need to post more on global warming so we can debate on that science. . .you took off your other postings and I didnt have a chance to reply.
pps. sorry for dropping the conversation on American exceptionalism; after the last post my senses were too overwhelmed by the whiffs of extremist patriotism and I had to leave off without a response.
My postings on global warming are still up--just not on the front pages. I suppose you will make the case of "scientific uncertainty" of biotech while proclaiming the certainty of forecasts about global temperatures a century from now. Please.
No they are both 'uncertain', but the term means different things to different people, as you have demonstraited. and yes I would make that case in terms of 'best science' and what we have to go on right now in terms of future harms from both biotech and global climate change. Again, not taking my offer up on some of the IPCC stuff leaves you blind to accepting all the so-called 'science' and discourse from the AEI and Hoover about 'scare-mongering' when we really dont know what is going on let alone the science of the physcial/biological systems that 'scare-mongers' are screaming about.
here recent writings on some biotech science you might find interesting and a bit hard(er) to dismiss outright as scare tactics (since when are scientists 'liberal' and not down right 'conservative' in most of their estimations about biotech and global warming since one's reputation is often on the line?):
(besides there is little that is 'uncertain' about GEOs in the environment e.g. the spread of GEO corn into Mexico which has banned GEOs being grown in the country; they cross biological barriers without regard for boundaries)
NYT: March 1, 2004
Keeping Seeds Safe
When an American farmer gets ready to plant a crop like corn or soybeans, he has two basic choices. Traditional seeds are the kind farmers have planted throughout history, developed by crossing parents with desirable traits to get a superior variety. Genetically modified seeds, first widely planted in 1996, contain trangenes from other organisms that convey specific advantages to mature plants — the ability to resist herbicides, for instance. The acreage planted with genetically modified crops has exploded: a third of this country's corn by 2002 and three-quarters of its soybeans. Whatever you make of this trend — and there are strong arguments on both sides — one question it raises is whether genes from modified plants might somehow drift into unmodified ones. The answer is yes.
In a pioneering study released last week, the Union of Concerned Scientists asked two independent labs to examine samples of traditional corn, soybean and canola seeds. The labs found contamination in half the corn, half the soybean and more than 80 percent of the canola varieties. The study draws no conclusions about when the mingling took place. It could have happened during field tests, after modified crops were widely planted or during shipping and storage. But the genetic purity of at least some traditional seed varieties has been compromised.
This is a serious finding. Though the acreage planted with modified crops is enormous, the number of varieties is still very small. But many more modified varieties — many of them for industrial and pharmaceutical crops — are being tested. The risk posed to the food supply by contamination from pharmaceutical crops will almost certainly be much greater than it is from genes that have migrated from, say, Roundup Ready corn. But there is a broader point. To contaminate traditional varieties of crops is to contaminate the genetic reservoir of plants on which humanity has depended for most of its history. In 2001, for instance, scientists discovered modified genes in traditional varieties of corn in Mexico, the ancestral home of the crop and the site of its greatest diversity.
The need now is for more extensive study, best undertaken by the Department of Agriculture. It's also time to subject genetically modified crops to more rigorous and more coherent testing. The scale of the experiment this country is engaged in — and its potential effect on the environment, the food supply and the purity of traditional seed stocks — demands vigilance on the same scale.
Scientists urge caution concerning genetically modified organisms
March 2, 2004 Ohio State University
A panel of scientists has recommended a more cautious approach towards releasing genetically engineered organisms (GEOs) into the environment. The panel, representing the Ecological Society of America, released its report today in Washington. Their recommendations include rigorously analyzing the risks and benefits associated with GEOs as well as conducting the research necessary to fill in the gaps in current regulations that governing GEOs.
The new report, "Genetically engineered organisms and the environment: Current status and recommendations," was compiled by a seven-member panel that included experts in plant and microbial biology, ecology, entomology, agronomy and fisheries. The group spent the past two years evaluating the ecological effects of current and future uses of GEOs. In spite of nearly a decade of heated public debate and worry over the safety of GEOs, and the huge growth in funding for developing GEOs, not much attention has been paid to the ecological studies analyzing the potential risks these organisms may create once they're released.
"Genetically engineered organisms can play a very positive role in environmental management globally," said Allison Snow, the lead author of the report and a professor of evolution, ecology and organismal Biology at Ohio State University. "But the deliberate or inadvertent release of GEOs could also spell ecological trouble under some circumstances." Snow and her colleagues gathered current scientific data on the state of GEOs, from viruses and other microorganisms to plants to animals.
A "genetically engineered organism" is a living thing that has deliberately been given a characteristic it wouldn't have gotten through the process of normal breeding. For example, about 10 years ago researchers in Hawaii found that inserting genetic material from a virus that nearly decimated the state's papaya plantations into the plant's genome provided papaya trees with resistance to that very same virus.
Genetic engineering is a powerful alternative to classic breeding – the ages-old method used to give organisms new, desirable traits – because specific genes from any source, be it microbe, plant, animal or even synthetic, can be artificially integrated directly into an organism's genome.
"Transgenes make it possible to create organisms with traits that cannot be obtained through normal sexual reproduction," Snow said. "There's great debate even within the scientific community about how transgenic organisms should be developed, regulated and deployed.”
"We wanted to provide ecological insight for consideration prior to releasing a GEO along with recommendations on how to evaluate the organism once it has established itself in the field," Snow said.
She and her colleagues made a number of recommendations for addressing the risks and helping to prevent unwanted side effects when developing and ultimately releasing GEOs. The recommendations are described in detail below. There is a need for rigorous, well-designed studies of the risks and benefits associated with GEOs that incorporate the inherent complexity of ecological systems. The panel members call for more support from government and commercial sectors for environmental risk assessment and risk management research.
On that note, the panel also calls for developing regulations based more heavily on scientific findings of risks and benefits. In the United States, GEOs are currently regulated by a handful of agencies, including the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency, along with several federal statutes.
"But regulators often have to make decisions before scientific findings are available," Snow said. "That's just not good enough, especially since what happens in some cases could be irreversible – once a transgene is out there in the environment, we can never get it back."
The report also recommends designing GEOs that reduce unwanted environmental risks by incorporating specific genetic features, such as methods to keep certain engineered organisms from interbreeding with their natural relatives.
Another key recommendation is preventing the release of GEOs with unwanted or potentially dangerous traits that could spread to natural populations, as strict confinement of these organisms is often impossible following their large-scale release.
"We're looking toward a future with far more genetically engineered plants, fish, insects, viruses, etc., than there are now," Snow said. "All sorts of things are possible, and we need to have a plan for how to avoid creating environmental problems."
The panel also calls for the well-designed monitoring of GEOs for identifying, managing and mitigating environmental risks when there are reasons to suspect potential problems.
"Because these novel genes are inherited in the same way as naturally occurring genes, they have the potential to persist indefinitely in both cultivated and natural populations," Snow said. Finally, the panel calls for giving broader training to ecologists, agricultural scientists, molecular biologists, etc., to adequately address the report's recommendations.
Collaborative, multidisciplinary research is important for understanding the environmental risks and benefits of GEOs.
"There is a need for better-quality science to look at the risks as well as the benefits of GEOs," Snow said. "We realize the future will likely be full of these organisms, and we want to be cautious and to have good science behind the decisions we make."
Snow worked with researchers from the universities of Minnesota, California-Davis and Nebraska; Cornell and Michigan State universities; and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
For the reports: http://www.ucsusa.org/foodandenvironment/biotechnology/seedindex.html http://www.esa.org/pao/esaPositions/Papers/geoposition.htm