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FDA Signs Off On Genetically Modified Salmon Without Labeling (consumerist.com)
kheldan writes: Today, in a historic decision, the FDA approved the marketing of genetically-engineered salmon for sale to the general public, without any sort of labeling to indicate to consumers they've been genetically altered. According to the article: "Though the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act) gives the FDA the authority to require mandatory labeling of foods if there is a material difference between a GE product and its conventional counterpart, the agency says it is not requiring labeling of these GE fish 'Because the data and information evaluated show that AquAdvantage Salmon is not materially different from other Atlantic salmon.' In this case, the GE salmon use an rDNA construct composed of the growth hormone gene from Chinook salmon under the control of a promoter from another type of fish called an 'ocean pout.' According to the FDA, this tweak to the DNA allows the salmon to grow to market size faster than non-GE farm-raised salmon."
I'm actually strongly in favor of using genetic manipulation to improve foods. But as long as the companies developing the technology continue to treat it as something to be concealed from consumers, how do they expect to win hearts and minds?
I'd be a lot more sympathetic to the GMO labels cause if the anti-GMO people used science to promote their cause. But they don't instead they appeal the fear with their ignorant Frankenfood arguments.
There's a too many mouths too feed without science to improve sustainable agriculture. In this case the oceans are over-farmed, and if this helps lighten the load, I'm all for it.
With that said, GMO is a tool like selective breeding that can be used for good or bad. This sounds like a good used, where as Monsanto is a disgusting company that embodies all that's wrong with big agriculture. They have technology that could do great things but instead use it to sell more chemical that turn our precious farmland into barren wastelands.
Worse, there is another issue - the looking in the light scenario:
Cop comes across a guy on his knees under a lamp post. Goes over and asks him what he is doing. Guy says "looking for my car keys." Cop asks "Where exactly where you standing when you lost them. Guy points at a spot 20 ft away, in the dark. Cop says "What are you doing looking for them here?" Guy responds "No way I'll find them in the dark. Here, at least I got a chance.
If you label something, it gives support to the idea that it is important and something to consider. The government has no business doing that for GM foods which it has found to be harmless.
The point is that people use whatever information they can obtain to base their decisions on. If we tell them what is and what is not GM, some people will refuse to buy the GM, even if they are not sure the non-GM is better. Price differentials will create a situation where only the poor get GM food. It might even end up killing the GM industry.
A similar thing has already happened with things like gluten free. 90% of the people buying gluten free products have ZERO issues digesting gluten. They had one bad reaction to a product and some ill-informed superstitious fool told them it was gluten related. So now they avoid gluten. Yes, there are a few people with gluten issues If you don't have celiac disease or at least sensitivity to gluten, gluten is not only fine, it's probably good for you. It's a whole grain and most people don't get enough of that.
The GM people don't want to be pushed into a situation similar to the gluten people - where idiotic superstitious people avoid their product.
The US government is NOT there to help people be superstitious. You want something to be labelled? Prove a negative consequence.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
So maybe they should spend some of the money they're using on concealing GM foods' provenance on you know, marketing all the wonderful properties of GM foods to consumers?
Isn't that how consumer information is supposed to work?
You are welcome on my lawn.
Wow. Just what I want - nutjobs deciding what information to hide from me about things I eat. Is it because they know what's best for me? Is it because they will make more money tricking me into purchasing something I normally wouldn't? Or is it because they don't want to upset my feeble brain by causing critical thinking in it?
Treat me like a rational human that is capable of making choices that benefit me or I won't buy any of your stuff.
"If we tell them what is and what is not GM, some people will refuse to buy the GM, even if they are not sure the non-GM is better."
Well, some others will choose to buy the GM, even if they are not sure the GM is better. Stupidity works both ways, you know?
I was under the impression that all this fuss about "free market" required "perfectly informed parties", right?
"It might even end up killing the GM industry"
And favoring the GM industry might even end up killing the Organic Foods industry. Didn't know it was some kind of government mandate to favor a side of an industry against any other.
I'm actually strongly in favor of using genetic manipulation to improve foods. But as long as the companies developing the technology continue to treat it as something to be concealed from consumers, how do they expect to win hearts and minds?
I don't see what all the hoopla is about. We don't need GMO labeling when there's already a free, voluntary alternative: NON-GMO labeling. When I go to the store, I pretty much assume that any product I buy contains GMOs unless a product specifically says on the label that it doesn't contain GMOs. Crazy, I know. What the anti-GMO crowd is hoping to do is scare people who don't know and most likely don't care if food is GMO or not.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
The problem is that many people are not "rational humans".
The main way that anti-GMO advertisement sways people is the fear of the unknown. All that have to do is say "we don't know it is safe" and they win over any facts that can be brought up. Just look at the anti-vaxers. They have no real evidence that vaccines cause autism but they still sway many people. The main problem is that it is impossible to prove that GMO foods are completely save. The best we can come up with is that all studies show no harm. Proving a negative is very hard if not impossible.
You were not. Does the food that you purchase identify the conglomerate which entirely owns the folksy subsidiary whos name appears on the product? Does it identify the wage scale of the workers who gathered, made, and/or packaged it? Do your canned foods even say "lined with BPA?"
You never had that impression. You're merely dragging out a trope of long-disproven economic theory in an attempt to require that a food product include a politically-driven disclosure that the producer does not wish to use.
Eveyone raising pigs NOT facing Mecca had better label them as such. So I'll know not to buy their products.
Have gnu, will travel.
The US government is NOT there to help people be superstitious. You want something to be labelled? Prove a negative consequence.
And yet, it becomes that much more difficult to prove something, if you don't have labels to begin with.
For example, if you want to prove that GM salmons, that grow up more quickly, will actually have accumulated less harmful mercury than other "older" non-modified salmons from the same area. In that case, you could expect the full cooperation and perhaps even some funding from the business who engineered the salmon.
However, now try to study the longterm health effects of GM salmons on real people. Can you survey people about what they eat? Probably not. If those people don't know what they're eating, then they can't really tell you what they ate. And while it may not be completely impossible to create a study where you could control for the fact that GM salmons aren't labeled, it does make it much more difficult to do so in the end.
"Does the food that you purchase identify the conglomerate which entirely owns the folksy subsidiary whos name appears on the product?"
No. Is that something good for me? Absolutly not. I'd be so much better served if it would be easier to know and track where the money comes from/to. Again, all this fuss about "free market" requires "perfectly informed parties".
"You never had that impression."
Oh, yes, certainly yes! I had so much that impression that I know for certain how far is our market from a free one. I'm not glad for the market to be even more opaque.
"You're merely dragging out a trope of long-disproven economic theory"
Which one? That it's better for me to make my decision in a properly informed fashion than not? When that came disproven?
"in an attempt to require that a food product include a politically-driven disclosure that the producer does not wish to use."
Disclosure, by its very definition, is not something that the producer wants at all. The consumer, on the other hand...
> The problem is that the anti-GM people are not logical.
Doesn't matter. If you have to lie to them, you are in the wrong.
Also, this nation was founded in many ways on religion- even the Deists count to some degree- so we already live in a nation full of irrational people.
There's no law against it. And you certainly can't lie to people because they believe in the wrong sky monkey. So why because they want to avoid GM foods?
If you have to lie, you're in the wrong. It's just that simple.
We can turn that same argument around and claim that the main way GMO manufacturers are swaying people is by concealing facts. Which of course they are, and anyone can verify that fact. Look at the hundred plus million dollars spent to not label products as GMO in just 2012-2013 (about 30 million in CA alone in 2012). Look at what the big players like Monsanto and Bayer pay for lobbying each year.
People want to believe that Genetically modified foods are going to be a savoir. The companies producing them sure don't show concern for anything but profits.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
So you aren't a big fan of science, then?
Science has made many things better for us. Food included.
They've been testing it for 25 years so far. Isn't that enough?
GM foods get labeled: "It's because they're dangerous."
GM foods don't get labeled: "It's because they have something to hide."
It doesn't matter which way it goes, people are always going to be distrustful of something they don't understand.
If a warning label is required for each new bit of technology that tin foil hatted idiots fear in some way, there will be no room left on many packages for the required nutritional statement, weight statement, or ingredients list or the UPC code or even a vague description. A loaf of bread might require a wrapper the size of a 40 gallon garbage bag in twenty years.
Seriously, if every advance in food that someone claims, with not a shred of scientific evidence, is harmful required a warning label, most of the packaging would be those warnings.
Let the government define what is allowed in 'negative' statements and what they mean ('no gluten' or 'no pesticides' or 'no technology from 1950 to 2015'). Then prosecute the hell out of anyone who uses one of the labels without meeting the requirements. Then, require no warnings about anything that the FDA has determined is not harmful in typical quantities. Then, the small minority who care can shop for only those items with the specific 'does not contain' labels for ingredients they have superstitions about. (Somewhat analogous to 'Kosher' labelling - no manufacturer is required to put 'Not Kosher' on their product label just because some group of people believe that pork, for example, is somehow bad for your soul).
Bisphenol in plastics was only banned recently, while scientists were bringing information about BPA more than one decade. Glyphosates.... Some countries banned Glyphosate (roundup), yet our FDA does not want to piss-off Monsanto. I bet that in ten years Roundup will be announced as cancerogenic, together with the Roundup resistant crops. There were also thalidomides, DDT, mercury based ointments, vaginal mesh, quaaludes, asbestos, Vioxx, and multiple other things where "highly informed officials", having "authority", have subsequently banned products due to real health concerns.
Long story short, FDA is not really good at balancing between corporate interests and their direct mandate (protect health). Let's not get started at the vaccination issues.The FDA problem is minor though.
The problem starts when some people within our own population feel entitled to opine about others and impose their own opinions on others on the pretense that other people are less educated. And such people insist that others follow their beliefs. GMO Salmon is one of them. Irrespective whether concerns are rational or irrational, people have a right to know everything there is to know about the products for one reason alone: if something goes wrong people will not be able to sue the government, and there is little point in litigating fish farm in Panama.
I will personally stop buying salmon.... for 30 years, just to be on the safe side.
I see where you wanted to go, but I have to nitpick a bit.
The price of a thing is established by a balance between supply and demand.
I'm not sure where you live, but there are absolutely zero free markets on planet Earth. Over the last 40 years prices have moved further toward taking people for everything possible and giving the least possible. That is what monopolization and deregulation (legalizing bribery) has done. If you believe you live in a free market, you have never attempted to own a business. In fact you have no idea about the history of Microsoft, BP, Standard Oil, Chiquita, Dole, Monsanto, etc.. etc...
You're not going to create a "new species" by inserting one gene and a promoter.
I find it really odd that people have such selective memory and comprehension ability. When it suits people to call it a new species they do, but in this case people play dumb. How many birds have such a minor difference from a relative that you can't detect it without DNA but we call them different species? Oh, we have lots of those. Then there is this thing called the "Killer Bee". You may have heard of it, but then again... The original intent was to make farming honey very effective and efficient, safer and more profitable. That was not even genetic modification, but cross breeding which caused that one. Even though the intent was altruistic, look what happened?
You want to tell me that the Frankenfish is safe (sorry, I heard the "News" call it that and got a laugh) I'll agree. For now it's safe. We generally don't find out otherwise until decades later that things we did were harmful. That's the way progression works. You don't have to like it, but to deny reality is idiotic.
Just like differences in farm raised versus wild, frozen versus refrigerated versus fresh etc., none of which are required to be labeled, it's all sold under a name
Reductio ad absurdum, and a flat out lie. If I buy ice cream and it has peanuts in it, the label has to have peanuts included in the ingredient list (and in many cases a big ole warning label). If it does not, the manufacturer will be shut down and sued. If I purchase sausage and it's 20% pork 80% beef, it's labelled that way. See the previous. Nobody has said we need GM fish to label itself for anything other than what it is. It is not a Coho Salmon, it's a genetically modified Salmon. Give it a fancy name, like Bob's Salmon if you want. It should however be distinguished from the natural fish.
It is a fact that bad things happen, even with the best intent. Why the hell would anyone attempt to hide what this is? Why the hell would anyone not demand such labeling. Look, if you want to be the first guy eating that cool looking Mushroom we just found, more power to ya. I'd rather make sure you are not dead after a few meals before I try it.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
> Better yet, catch it yourself. It's quite an enjoyable and delicious hobby.
Right, I'll be sure to catch myself a years worth of salmon during the brief period they are catchable here. I'm sure my job won't miss me for however many weeks that takes, if it's even possible. Clearly if I want wild caught fish, or fish that don't have lab tuned genes, I should have to be a subsistence hunter.
Actually he should be blaming economics.
But his point is valid. Science is agnostic. You can make a medicine or a poison. Science makes awful things with awful uses, good things with good uses, but mostly it makes things that can be used wisely or foolishly.
Sure, it's incorrect to blame science for the foolishness of fools. But at this point, I wonder if the anti-GM people don't have a point. All the research has turned into so far is another way to change the food supply en masse, while corporations fight for their right to not have to tell anyone what the fuck the food even is. When you see this happen again and again, the luddite view of trying to outright ban it (so as to remove the economic incentive) starts to have a lot of good reasoning behind it.
And no, there's probably nothing wrong with most GM foods. This fish thing will help feed the world- we can't sustain fishing with a growing population, we need badly to farm fish, and this is a solid solution. And I was down with that... right up until they fought to not have to mark their food. That means they have something to hide, it means that they are automatically in the wrong. I'm not a food scientist or a fish scientist or whatever, but I know naked deception and greed when it is presented so openly.
> there will be no room left on many packages for the required nutritional statement, weight statement, or ingredients list
I know that at least the nutritional info and ingredients lists faced huge pushback from corporations that wanted to keep lying about the foods. They pushed back on the transfat labels. They will do anything to prevent you knowing what is in your food. There is no moral defense for that. People have to eat.
What's wrong is they get tarred by the same brush as whatever Monsanto is getting up to lately if they have the GM label - sucks even if they have nothing to hide.
The sort of thing I mean was Monsanto suing farmers adjacent to those with GM crops for "stealing" their product via cross pollonation by insects and wind.
That means they have something to hide, it means that they are automatically in the wrong.
And if they do label, it means there is something wrong with their product. This is a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation.
Speaking of labels, I've never seen it labeled that oranges are often grafted into Poncitrus trifoliata rootstocks. Does that mean that all orange growers are also hiding something, or do I first have to start a movement convincing people that grafting causes cancer before the orange farmers must either put a scarlet letter on their fruit or become also in the wrong?
No, innocent until proven guilty is a pretty good standard. Do you have evidence that GE crops are intrinsically dangerous? Because I have plenty of reason to think otherwise. Saying there might be some potential but as of yet unknown unknown is as compelling as warning me about the invisible pink unicorn.
Especially because the guys who want to prove it safe have huge financial motivation and anyone trying to prove the opposite just wants to eat food because they purchased a lifetime subscription to a digestive tract.
Really, you mean to say there isn't a multi-billion dollar organic industry out there, and plenty of professional activists staking their careers on making noise? And you mean to imply all those in academic positions who work with GE are part of some money making plot? That's bullshit and you know it.
That's your opinion and you have a right to it but 'innocent until proven guilty' does not apply to consumers buying food products. If I don't want to eat Broccoli, Tomatoes, etc... or GM crops for that matter I do not need to justify why I don't want to eat them to a judge and jury in a court of law. I just don't want to eat those products... period! What gives you and the GE industry the right to deprive people of the ability to read a label and make the choice not to eat what you are producing for whatever reason seems best to them? I understand your dilemma and the source of your anger, the GM industry wants to make GM food indistinguishable form the non-GM variety by preventing labelling of GM foods from becoming a legal requirement and here are organic food producers voluntarily labelling their foods non-GM and cutting into the GM industries profit margins. That must be frustrating, but calling organic food producers or people who don't want to eat GM foods names is not going to help you, it just makes you look embittered and angry.
They did show that the genetic modification resulted in food that is safe, to the satisfaction of the FDS.
I've said this before -- if you want labels to differentiate, then add a label to non-GMO food (and obviously, enforce truth-in-advertising laws on that). That's not something that a producer of GMO food can reasonably lobby to prevent.
To justify requiring somebody else to label something on their product, there should be some reason that this information is particularly more important than, say, the percentage of your hamburger that is composed of cattle who exhibited homosexual behaviour in the field. Which I am absolutely certain some crazy people would pay attention to if it was written on a label, and I'm also certain that all the producers would fight against this label because that's a total pain in the ass with no good purpose. If gay cattle are so safe, why aren't you proudly labelling them? Clearly you're hiding something. Like the fact that this is how GAY spreads.