From: stefan stoss [jstoss99@yahoo.com]
Sent: Saturday, March 24, 2001 4:55 PM
To: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov
Subject: "Docket 00N-1396 & Docket 00D-1598" 

    to respect the constitutional right of freedom of
conscience please clearly label GMOs so that an
intelligent choice can be made in accordance with the
purpose of life.

--- Stefan Stoss <jstos@vcn.bc.ca> wrote:
> Date: Thu, 15 Feb 2001 15:07:26 -0800 (PST)
> From: Stefan Stoss <jstos@vcn.bc.ca>
> To: jstoss99@yahoo.com
> Subject: GE - The Unholy Alliance by Dr Mae-Wan Ho
> (part 1) (fwd)
> 
> 
> 
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Sat, 6 Dec 1997 21:26:40 -0400
> From: Richard Wolfson <rwolfson@concentric.net>
> To: info@natural-law.ca
> Subject: GE - The Unholy Alliance by Dr Mae-Wan Ho
> (part 1)
> 
> Thanks to the RTS genetic engineering newsgroup
> <rts@gn.apc.org> for
> distributing this article:
> ..........................
> 
> "O.K... this is another long one, but it is a must
> read! If there was one
> piece you had to read about biotechnology, it is
> this one. " -Adam and
> Steph [A Seed]                                      
>   __________________
> 
>  The Unholy Alliance by Dr Mae-Wan Ho (Feature
> Article from The Ecologist,
> Vol.27, No.4, July/August)                          
>                - part1-
> 
> Genetic engineering biotechnology is inherently
> hazardous. It could lead to
> disasters far worse than those caused by accidents
> to nuclear
> installations. In the words of the author, "genes
> can replicate
> indefinitely, spread and recombine." For this reason
> the release of a
> genetically engineered micro-organism that is lethal
> to humans could well
> spell the end of humanity. Unfortunately the
> proponents of this terrifying
> technology share a genetic determinist mindset that
> leads them to reject
> the inherently dangerous nature of their work. What
> is particularly
> worrying at first sight is the irresistible power of
> the large corporations
> which are pushing this technology.
> 
> Suddenly, the brave new world dawns. Suddenly, as
> 1997 begins and the
> millennium is drawing to a close, men and women in
> the street are waking up
> to the realization that genetic engineering
> biotechnology is taking over
> every aspect of their daily lives. They are caught
> unprepared for the
> avalanche of products arriving, or soon to arrive,
> in their supermarkets:
> rapeseed oil, soybean, maize, sugar beet, squash,
> cucumber ... It started
> as a mere trickle less than three years ago - the
> BST-milk from cows fed
> genetically engineered bovine growth hormone to
> boost milk yield, and the
> tomato genetically engineered to prolong shelf-life.
> They had provoked so
> much debate and opposition; as did indeed, the
> genetic screening tests for
> an increasing number of diseases. Surely, we
> wouldn't, and shouldn't, be
> rushed headlong into the brave new world.
> 
> Back then, in order to quell our anxiety, a series
> of highly publicized
> "consensus conferences" and "public consultations"
> were carried out.
> Committees were set up by many European governments
> to consider the risks
> and the ethics, and the debates continued. The
> public were, however, only
> dimly aware of critics who deplored "tampering with
> nature" and "scrambling
> the genetic code of species" by introducing human
> genes into animals, and
> animal genes into vegetables. Warnings of unexpected
> effects on agriculture
> and biodiversity, of the dangers of irreversible
> "genetic pollution",
> warnings of genetic discrimination and the return of
> eugenics, as genetic
> screening and prenatal diagnosis became widely
> available, were
> marginalized. So too were condemnations of the
> immorality of the "patents
> on life" - transgenic animals, plants and seeds,
> taken freely by
> geneticists of developed countries from the Third
> World, as well as human
> genes and human cell lines from indigenous peoples.
> 
> By and large, the public were lulled into a false
> sense of security, in the
> belief that the best scientists and the new breed of
> "bioethicists" in the
> country were busy considering the risks associated
> with the new
> biotechnology and the ethical issues raised.
> Simultaneously, glossy
> information pamphlets and reports, which aimed at
> promoting "public
> understanding" of genetic "modification" were widely
> distributed by the
> biotech industries and their friends, and endorsed
> by government
> scientists. "Genetic modification", we are told, is
> simply the latest in a
> "seamless" continuum of biotechnologies practised by
> human beings since the
> dawn of civilization, from bread and wine-making, to
> selective breeding.
> The significant advantage of genetic modification is
> that it is much more
> "precise", as genes can be individually isolated and
> transferred as
> desired.
> 
> Thus, the possible benefits promised to humankind
> are limitless. There is
> something to satisfy everyone. For those morally
> concerned about inequality
> and human suffering, it promises to feed the hungry
> with genetically
> modified crops able to resist pests and diseases and
> to increase yields.
> For those who despair of the present global
> environmental deterioration, it
> promises to modify strains of bacteria and higher
> plants that can degrade
> toxic wastes or mop up heavy metals(contaminants).
> For those hankering
> after sustainable agriculture, it promises to
> develop Greener, more
> environmentally friendly transgenic crops that will
> reduce the use of
> pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers.
> 
> That is not all. It is in the realm of human
> genetics that the real
> revolution will be wrought. Plans to uncover the
> entire genetic blueprint
> of the human being would, we are told, eventually
> enable geneticists to
> diagnose, in advance, all the diseases that an
> individual will suffer in
> his or her lifetime, even before the individual is
> born, or even as the egg
> is fertilized in vitro. A whole gamut of specific
> drugs tailored to
> individual genetic needs can be designed to cure all
> diseases. The
> possibility of immortality is dangling from the
> horizons as the "longevity
> gene" is isolated.
> 
> There are problems, of course, as there would be in
> any technology. The
> ethical issues have to be decided by the public. (By
> implication, the
> science is separate and not open to question.) The
> risks will be minimized.
> (Again, by implication, the risks have nothing to do
> with the science.)
> After all, nothing in life is without risk. Crossing
> roads is a risk. The
> new biotechnology (i.e. genetic engineering
> biotechnology) is under very
> strict government regulation, and the government's
> scientists and other
> experts will see to it that neither the consumer nor
> the environment will
> be unduly harmed.
> 
> Then came the relaxation of regulation on
> genetically modified products, on
> grounds that over-regulation is compromising the
> "competitiveness" of the
> industry, and that hundreds of field trials have
> demonstrated the new
> biotechnology to be safe. And, in any case, there is
> no essential
> difference between transgenic plants produced by the
> new biotechnology and
> those produced by conventional breeding methods.
> (One prominent
> spokesperson for the industry even went as far as to
> refer to the varieties
> produced by conventional breeding methods,
> retrospectively, as
> "transgenics".(1) This was followed, a year later,
> by the avalanche of
> products approved, or seeking, approval marketing,
> for which neither
> segregation from non-genetically engineered produce
> nor labelling is
> required. One is left to wonder why, if the products
> are as safe and
> wonderful as claimed, they could not be segregated,
> as organic produce has
> been for years, so that consumers are given the
> choice of buying what they
> want.
> 
> A few days later, as though acting on cue, the
> Association of British
> Insurers announced that, in future, people applying
> for life policies will
> have to divulge the results of any genetic tests
> they have taken. This is
> seen, by many, as a definite move towards open
> genetic discrimination. A
> few days later, a scientist of the Roslin Institute
> near Edinburgh
> announced that they had successfully "cloned" a
> sheep from a cell taken
> from the mammary gland of an adult animal. "Dolly",
> the cloned lamb, is now
> seven months old. Of course it took nearly 300
> trials to get one success,
> but no mention is made of the vast majority of the
> embryos that failed. Is
> that ethical? If it can be done on sheep, does it
> mean it can be done for
> human beings? Are we nearer to cloning human beings?
> The popular media went
> wild with heroic enthusiasm at one extreme to the
> horror of Frankenstein at
> the other. Why is this work only coming to public
> attention now, when the
> research has actually been going on for at least 10
> years?(2)
> 
> The public are totally unprepared. They are being
> plunged headlong, against
> their will, into the brave new genetically
> engineered world, in which
> giant, faceless multinational corporations will
> control every aspect of
> their lives, from the food they can eat, to the baby
> they can conceive and
> give birth to.
> 
> __________________________________________________
> 
> I should, right away, dispel the myth that genetic
> engineering is just like
> conventional breeding techniques. It is not. Genetic
> engineering bypasses
> conventional breeding by using the artificially
> constructed vectors to
> multiply copies of genes, and in many cases, to
> carry and smuggle genes
> into cells. Once inside cells, these vectors slot
> themselves into the host
> genome. In this way, transgenic organisms are made
> carrying the desired
> transgenes. The insertion of foreign genes into the
> host genome has long
> been known to have many harmful and fatal effects
> including cancer; and
> this is born out by the low success rate of creating
> desired transgenic
> organisms. Typically, a large number of eggs or
> embryos have to be injected
> or infected with the vector to obtain a few
> organisms that successfully
> express the transgene.
> 
> The most common vectors used in genetic engineering
> biotechnology are a
> chimaeric recombination of natural genetic parasites
> from different
> sources, including viruses causing cancers and other
> diseases in  animals
> and plants, with their pathogenic functions
> 'crippled', and tagged with one
> or more antibiotic resistance 'marker' genes, so
> that cells transformed
> with the vector can be selected. For example, the
> vector most widely used
> in plant genetic engineering is derived from a
> tumour-inducing plasmid
> carried by the soil bacterium Agrobacterium
> tumefaciens. In animals,
> vectors are constructed from retroviruses causing
> cancers and other
> diseases. A vector currently used in fish has a
> framework from the Moloney
> marine leukaemic virus, which causes leukaemia in
> mice, but can infect all
> mammalian cells. It has bits from the Rous Sarcoma
> virus, causing sarcomas
> in chickens, and from the vesicular stomatitis
> virus, causing oral lesions
> in cattle, horses, pigs and humans. Such mosaic
> vectors are particularly
> hazardous. Unlike natural parasitic genetic elements
> which have various
> degrees of host specificity, vectors used in genetic
> engineering, partly by
> design, and partly on account of their mosaic
> character, have the ability
> to overcome species barriers, and to infect a wide
> range of species.
> Another obstacle to genetic engineering is that all
> organisms and cells
> have natural defence mechanisms that enable them to
> destroy or inactivate
> foreign genes, and transgene instability is a big
> problem for the industry.
> Vectors are now increasingly constructed to overcome
> those mechanisms that
> maintain the integrity of species. The result is
> that the artificially
> constructed vectors are especially good at carrying
> out horizontal gene
> transfer.
> 
> Let me summarize why rDNA technology differs
> radically from conventional
> breeding techniques.  ** 1. Genetic engineering
> recombines genetic material
> in the laboratory between species that do not
> interbreed in nature.  ** 2.
> While conventional breeding methods shuffle
> different forms (alletes) of
> the same genes, genetic engineering enables
> completely new (exotic) genes
> to be introduced with unpredictable effects on the
> physiology and
> biochemistry of the resultant transgenic organism. 
> ** 3. Gene
> multiplications and a high proportion of gene
> transfers are mediated by
> vectors which have the following undesirable
> characteristics:  * a. many
> are derived from disease-causing viruses, plasmids
> and mobile genetic
> elements - parasitic DNA that have the ability to
> invade cells and insert
> themselves into the cell's genome causing genetic
> damages.  * b. they are
> designed to break down species barriers so that they
> can shuttle genes
> between a wide range of species. Their wide host
> range means that they can
> infect many animals and plants, and in the process
> pick up genes from
> viruses of all these species to create new
> pathogens.  * c. they routinely
> carry genes for antibiotic resistance, which is
> already a big health
> problem.  * d. they are increasingly constructed to
> overcome the recipient
> species' defence mechanisms that break down or
> inactivate foreign DNA.
> 
> __________________________________________________
> 
> Isn't it a bit late in the day to tell us that?, you
> ask. Yes and no. Yes,
> because I, who should, perhaps, have known better,
> was caught unprepared
> like the rest. And no, because there have been so
> many people warning us of
> that eventuality, who have campaigned tirelessly on
> our behalf, some of
> them going back to the earliest days of genetic
> engineering in the 1970s -
> although we have paid them little heed. No, it is
> not too late, if only
> because that is precisely what we tend to believe,
> and are encouraged to
> believe. A certain climate is created - that of
> being rapidly overtaken by
> events - reinforcing the feeling that the tidal wave
> of progress brought on
> by the new biotechnology is impossible to stem, so
> that we may be paralysed
> into accepting the inevitable, No, because we shall
> not give up, for the
> consequence of giving up is the brave new world, and
> soon after that, there
> may be no world at all. The gene genie is fast
> getting out of control. The
> practitioners of genetic engineering biotechnology,
> the regulators and the
> critics alike, have all underestimated the risks
> involved, which are
> inherent to genetic engineering biotechnology,
> particularly as misguided by
> an outmoded and erroneous world-view that comes from
> bad science. The
> dreams may already be turning into nightmares.
> 
> That is why people like myself are calling for an
> immediate moratorium on
> further releases and marketing of genetically
> engineered products, and for
> an independent public enquiry to be set up to look
> into the risks and
> hazards involved, taking into account the most
> comprehensive, scientific
> knowledge in addition to the social, moral
> implications. This would be most
> timely, as public opposition to genetic engineering
> biotechnology has been
> gaining momentum throughout Europe and the USA.
> 
> In Austria, a record 1.2 million citizens,
> representing 20 per cent of the
> electorate, have signed a people's petition to ban
> genetically engineered
> foods, as well as deliberate releases of genetically
> modified organisms and
> patenting of life. Genetically modified foods were
> also rejected earlier by
> a lay people consultation in Norway, and by 95 per
> cent of consumers in
> Germany, as revealed by a recent survey. The
> European Parliament has voted
> by an overwhelming 407 to 2 majority to censure the
> Commission's
> authorization, in December 1996, for imports of
> Ciba-Geigy's transgenic
> maize into Europe, and is calling for imports to be
> suspended while the
> authorization is re-examined. The European
> Commission has decided that in
> the future genetically engineered seeds will be
> labelled, and is also
> considering proposals for retroactive labelling.
> Commissioner Emma Bonino
> is to set up a new scientific committee to deal with
> genetically engineered
> foods, members of which are to be completely
> independent of the food
> industry. Meanwhile, Franz Fischler, the European
> Commissioner on
> Agriculture, supports a complete segregation and
> labelling of production
> lines of genetically modified and non-genetically
> modified foods.
> 
> In June this year, President Clinton imposed a
> five-year ban on human
> cloning in the USA, while the UK House of Commons
> Science and Technology
> Committee (STC) wants British law to be amended to
> ensure that human
> cloning is illegal. The STC, President Chirac of
> France and German Research
> Minister Juergen Ruettgers are also calling for an
> international ban on
> human cloning.
> 
> Like other excellent critics before me,(3) I do not
> think there is a grand
> conspiracy afoot, though there are many forces
> converging to a single
> terrible end. Susan George comments, "They don't
> have to conspire if they
> have the same world-view, aspire to similar goals
> and take concerted steps
> to attain them."(4)
> 
> I am one of those scientists who have long been
> highly critical of the
> reductionist mainstream scientific world-view, and
> have begun to work
> towards a radically different approach for
> understanding nature.(5) But I
> was unable, for a long time, to see how much science
> really matters in the
> affairs of the real world, not just in terms of
> practical inventions like
> genetic engineering, but in how that scientific
> world-view takes hold of
> people's unconscious, so that they take action,
> involuntarily,
> unquestioningly, to shape the world to the detriment
> of human beings. I was
> so little aware of how that science is used, without
> conscious intent, to
> intimidate and control, to obfuscate, to exploit and
> oppress; how that
> dominant world-view generates a selective blindness
> to make scientists
> themselves ignore or misread scientific evidence.
> 
> The point, however, is not that science is bad - but
> that there can be bad
> science that ill-serves humanity. Science can often
> be wrong. The history
> of science can just as well be written in terms of
> the mistakes made than
> as the series of triumphs it is usually made out to
> be. Science is nothing
> more, and nothing less, than a system of concepts
> for understanding nature
> and for obtaining reliable knowledge that enables us
> to live sustainably
> with nature. In that sense, one can ill-afford to
> give up science, for it
> is through our proper understanding and knowledge of
> nature that we can
> live a satisfying life, that we can ultimately
> distinguish the good
> science, which serves humanity, from the bad science
> that does not. In this
> view, science is imbued with moral values from the
> start, and cannot be
> disentangled from them. Therefore it is bad science
> that purports to be
> "neutral" and divorced from moral values, as much as
> it is bad science that
> ignores scientific evidence.
> 
> It is clear that I part company with perhaps a
> majority of my scientist
> colleagues in the mainstream, who believe that
> science can never be wrong,
> although it can be misused. Or else they carefully
> distinguish science, as
> neutral and value-free, from its application,
> technology, which can do harm
> or good.(6) This distinction between science and
> technology is spurious,
> especially in the case of an experimental science
> like genetics, and almost
> all of biology, where the techniques determine what
> sorts of question are
> asked and hence the range of answers that are
> important, significant and
> relevant to the science. Where would molecular
> genetics be without the
> tools that enable practitioners to recombine and
> manipulate our destiny? It
> is an irresistibly heroic view, except that it is
> totally wrong and
> misguided.
> 
> It is also meaningless, therefore, to set up Ethical
> Committees which do
> not question the basic scientific assumptions behind
> the practice of
> genetic engineering biotechnology. Their brief is
> severely limited, often
> verging on the trivial and banal - such as whether a
> pork gene transferred
> to food plants might be counter to certain religious
> beliefs - in
> comparison with the much more fundamental questions
> of eugenics, genetic
> discrimination and, indeed, whether gene transfers
> should be carried out at
> all. They can do nothing more than make the
> unacceptable acceptable to the
> public.
> 
> The debate on genetic engineering biotechnology is
> dogged by the artificial
> separation imposed between "pure" science and the
> issues it gives rise to.
> "Ethics" is deemed to be socially determined, and
> therefore negotiable,
> while the science is seen to be beyond reproach, as
> it is the "laws" of
> nature. The same goes for the distinction between
> "technology" - the
> application of science - from the science. Risk
> assessments are to do with
> the technology, leaving the science equally
> untouched. The technology can
> be bad for your health, but not the science. In this
> article, I shall show
> why science cannot be separated from moral values
> nor from the technology
> that shapes our society. In other words, bad science
> is unquestionably bad
> for one's health and well-being, and should be
> avoided at all costs.
> Science is, above all, fallible and negotiable,
> because we have the choice,
> to do or not to do. It should be negotiated for the
> public good. That is
> the only ethical position one can take with regard
> to science. Otherwise,
> we are in danger of turning science into the most
> fundamentalist of
> religions, that, working hand in hand with corporate
> interests, will surely
> usher in the brave new world.
> 
> 
> 
> ** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C.
> Section 107, this material is
> distributed without profit to those who have
> expressed a prior interest in
> receiving this information for research and
> educational purposes. **
> 
> 
>
_________________________________________________________
> Richard Wolfson,  PhD
> Campaign for Mandatory Labelling and Long-term
> Testing of all Genetically Engineered Foods
> Natural Law Party, 500 Wilbrod Street
> Ottawa, ON  Canada  K1N 6N2
> Tel. 613-565-8517  Fax. 613-565-1596
> email:  rwolfson@concentric.net
> 
> Our website,
> http://www.natural-law.ca/genetic/geindex.html
> contains more information on genetic engineering.
> 
> To receive regular news on genetic engineering and
> this
> campaign, please send an email message with
> 'subscribe GE'
> in the subject line to rwolfson@concentric.net   To
> unsubscribe, please send the message 'unsubscribe
> GE'
>
__________________________________________________________
>
__________________________________________________________
> 
> 
> 


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