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Old 12-22-2012, 10:03 PM   #1
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Delicious FrankenFish



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Originally Posted by The Los Angeles Times
After more than a decade in regulatory limbo, genetically engineered Atlantic salmon that grow faster than their naturally born counterparts moved closer to American plates, with the publication Friday of a government report that found the fish wouldn't hurt the environment and would be safe to eat.

The draft report, released by the Food and Drug Administration after months of unexplained delay, was greeted with cheers by members of the biotech community and anger by opponents of genetically modified foods, who commonly refer to the AquAdvantage salmon as a "Frankenfish."

Two years ago, the FDA tentatively ruled that the salmon could safely be consumed by humans and that the fish would not harm wild species. The current report advances the process.

A 60-day period of public comment on the 158-page environmental assessment and its conclusions now follows before the FDA will decide whether to give the salmon its blessing or take some other action. There is no timeline on when that next step may happen, said FDA spokeswoman Shelly Burgess.

"I have a smile on my face — it certainly looks good for the fish moving forward," said David Edwards, director of animal biotechnology for the Biotechnology Industry Organization in Washington. "It shows that the administration is willing to move forward on these technologies and allow the U.S. to be the leader that we should be."

AquAdvantage salmon grows twice as fast as conventional salmon because a growth hormone gene derived from the chinook variety has been spliced into its DNA. If approved, it would be the first genetically modified animal intended for food use to pass that milestone in the United States. Edwards and others said it would invigorate the field of animal biotechnology, which is currently so moribund in the U.S. that industry investment is near-nonexistent; scientists have stopped training students in the craft, and researchers have shut down their projects or moved them overseas.

But the FDA's actions — and the timing of its announcement, on the eve of a long holiday weekend — drew outrage from consumer advocacy groups who are not convinced that the fish is environmentally benign nor that it's safe to eat. More than 400,000 public comments urging regulators not to approve the fish have been submitted to the FDA since the agency opened discussion of the issue in 2010, according to George Kimbrell, senior attorney for the Washington-based Center for Food Safety.

Kimbrell noted that the FDA's documents are dated May 4, 2012, and said that releasing them on Dec. 21 was "cynical" and "political." There have been rumblings for months that the White House was dragging its feet on the controversial issue because it didn't want to make an unpopular decision during an election year.

"It's 'the day the world was supposed to end' but in fact the day we are all on vacation," Kimbrell said, in a reference to the so-called Maya doomsday. "I think the agency is aware of the controversial and irresponsible nature of its decision and wanted it to go out on the quietest day of the year."

Kimbrell and statements from other advocacy groups opposed to genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, said that safety tests on the fish were inadequate and that the faster-growing AquAdvantage salmon could potentially out-compete wild Atlantic salmon if they escaped captivity and threatened wild fish stocks.

AquaBounty Technologies Inc., the Maynard, Mass.-based company that developed the fish, says that contention is unsupported by science.

The FDA's environmental review and safety conclusions focus narrowly on specific plans that AquaBounty put in place for raising and processing the modified salmon. Unlike conventionally farmed salmon, the AquAdvantage fish would not be raised in ocean pens and would not be brought live into the United States.

Instead, the fish would be farmed on Prince Edward Island in Canada. Eggs that they produced would be transported to Panama, where they would hatch and be raised in inland freshwater tanks. The farmed fish — sterile and female — would be processed overseas and the flesh transported to the United States for market.

AquaBounty President and Chief Executive Ronald Stotish said that the Panama facility would permit production of tons of fish and that more tanks could be added. Ultimately, he said, additional facilities could be built at other sites, including places within the United States that are near urban centers.

The company would have to receive FDA approval for each expansion of its facilities, however.

"The attributes of our product and a land-based system are exactly what environmental groups are asking for," Stotish said. "We hope that when they read the environmental assessment they will understand the science and the benefits of our product and stop opposing us just because we're different."

Gregory Jaffe, director of the biotechnology project at the Center for Science in the Public Interest in Washington, said he saw no evidence to suggest that the salmon would be unhealthful to eat nor that AquaBounty's Panama facility would pose an environmental risk. But he added that the small volume of fish the company could produce there amounts to "a lot of effort for not a lot of fish" — and thus the plan amounts to no more than a proof of concept.

For the AquAdvantage salmon to make a dent in the market, many more tanks would have to be built — and the environmental impact of all of them together can't be assessed by approving them one at a time, Jaffe said: "Each one individually may have safeguards to prevent environmental impact, but if you look cumulatively, errors happen."

Movement from the FDA may come in the nick of time for AquaBounty, which is also developing fast-growing trout and tilapia but is close to running out of money.

"If they go to production and people actually buy this fish in spite of what's being said, then I think other investors will see other opportunities for transgenic animals," said James Murray, an animal geneticist at UC Davis who has developed genetically engineered goats to fight diarrheal diseases in children. "Even if it's not successful, just the fact that an animal product can be approved will mean to investors that the potential for a good idea can be carried through to market."

The FDA's actions Friday say nothing about whether the fish, should it ultimately come to market, would need to be labeled. California voters recently considered a ballot initiative to require labels on certain foods with genetically modified ingredients, but the measure failed.
...

Source.
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Old 12-22-2012, 10:39 PM   #2
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Is that Doppleganger posting pictures of dead animals again?

When I go to upscale seafood restaurants I want to order a freshly caught Atlantic Salmon, not an ``AquAdvantage''. I do like the idea of inland tanks, though, since it means landlocked regions will be able to have fresh seafood without the exorbitant costs.
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Old 12-22-2012, 10:59 PM   #3
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dosuser View Post
Is that Doppleganger posting pictures of dead animals again?
Zing.

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Originally Posted by dosuser View Post

When I go to upscale seafood restaurants I want to order a freshly caught Atlantic Salmon, not an ``AquAdvantage''. I do like the idea of inland tanks, though, since it means landlocked regions will be able to have fresh seafood without the exorbitant costs.
Are you against GMOs?
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Old 12-22-2012, 11:03 PM   #4
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I love fish but.. seafood is so fucking dirty. The skin of fish is supposed to be the most delicious part. But instead it always tastes like shit. Do you know why? Because their skin absorbs most of the shit in the ocean/water like a filter. And so it tastes awful.
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Old 12-22-2012, 11:08 PM   #5
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Dem fish wus jineticklee enjineer'd by da damn lib guverment ta put mind controll kemikuls in mah brain!

......... I've been spending far too much time on /pol/.

In all seriousness, I'm quite interested in this. Though I'm not a giant fan of fish, salmon is the one I enjoy the most and I'd be interested to see how the AquAdvantage fish stacks up to its naturally born cousins. And the inland tanks sound pretty kickass.
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Old 12-22-2012, 11:31 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Doppleganger View Post
Are you against GMOs?
I'm not against it at all... I just want to feel smug eating the Real Thing while the peasants enjoy their cheap, mass-produced version with a cheesy brand name. It's like the KFC of seafood!

Of course, being a lowly peasant myself, that will probably never happen. =3= On the plus side, if they plan to start selling it in Maynard, I could go over there to give it a try and report back.
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Old 12-22-2012, 11:41 PM   #7
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Didn't even realize this was news -- because I could've sworn GM salmon had been on the market for over 15 years by this point.
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Old 12-22-2012, 11:52 PM   #8
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Quote:
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Didn't even realize this was news -- because I could've sworn GM salmon had been on the market for over 15 years by this point.
Something I've always hoped would happen is someone release GloFish into the estuaries or rivers in Northern California so the waters light up at night. But, I think Fish & Game is terrified of such an occurrence, which is why California's banned GloFish.
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Old 12-23-2012, 01:30 AM   #9
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So the next time we clone Dolly the sheep, she will be more diesel before we send her off to the butcher shop?
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Old 12-23-2012, 07:03 AM   #10
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Ugh why must things progress so slowly. I get that they want to make sure it's safe to eat and that's fine, but "more than a decade in regulatory limbo" isn't being cautious it's just massive feet dragging.
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Old 12-23-2012, 03:37 PM   #11
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Well, as you all probably know, I have quite the environmentalist streak and a huge respect for nature. So just let me say that this is about fucking time. This should have been done years ago. This is science moving forward to make life better. This is the kind of thing that will help feed the world, one mouth at a time. This is the future.

Now, I don't like fish, for the most part (salmon is nice, and I am a fan of sushi, but not much beyond that), but if we can do this with fish, make it standard, then there's no limit to what we can do. GMOs are already extremely common in fruit and vegetables, and farmers have been doing a low-tech version of this for many centuries, called selective breeding. Dangers need to be addressed, of course, but we can't just go crazy anytime anyone says "genetically-modified".

So, yeah, my sentiments lie with most of y'all's.
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Old 12-23-2012, 06:15 PM   #12
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That's not a very environmentalist view. From what I understand, people are worried that by altering the salmon it could have unknown effects on the environment. Growing faster could mean a higher need to consume more food and ultimate destroy populations of whatever salmon eat, possibly crippling other species and such.

If they're all tank bred and raised and controlled, this isn't an issue, but if they broke out, it could be an issue. It's bad enough when a natural species is introduced to a different area and completely dominate the environment. Adding a genetically modified superfish could be problematic as well.

Also, I'm sure people are thinking we're playing God when we start creating our own species.
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Old 12-23-2012, 09:17 PM   #13
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Yeah, respecting nature is pretty much the opposite of this.

Not a big fish person, but if you can't taste the difference and it doesn't hurt anyone, why not?
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Old 12-23-2012, 10:49 PM   #14
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I am some of an environmentalist, just not one of the crazy ones. I think that as long as the consequences are addressed, there's no reason to not look into it as a possibility.
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