On Jan. 15, the FDA announced the meat and milk from cloned cows, pigs and goats to be as safe as the food products from their natural counterparts, and would be permitted to enter the U.S. food supply unlabeled.
The news came after research labs across the country spent years comparing cloned and non-cloned animals, ultimately finding the food products from the two groups to be the same.
Regardless of what the science says, public fears and misunderstandings about cloning have led to more than a few raised eyebrows since the FDA ruling.
Living in America's Dairyland, cloned milk is no joke. What exactly will a cloned cheese curd taste like, and how can we be sure it's really safe? Lucey, who has spent time studying the milk of cloned cows, shares his knowledge.
Daily Cardinal: Why clone animals for meat and milk and not stick to the old fashioned way of breeding animals for food?
Lucey: At this point, the cost of cloning of animals for food production remains way more costly than non-cloning means, so it is unlikely for cloning to replace traditional practices for food production anytime soon.
However, some people are interested in using cloning to reproduce an animal with the best characteristics. For instance, if a person owns a prize-winning, high value bull, he or she may be interested in creating a genetic copy of their perfect bull. While cloning the prized bull would be very expensive, the process would create a genetic copy of the star animal.
DC: How do scientists clone animals?
Lucey: In very basic terms, cloning is like photocopying the genetic information of an animal and re-inserting it into a host cell. With a clone, there is no mixing of genetic material or inserting or deleting of genes (as is the case in genetic modification). A clone is simply a duplicate genetic copy.
Cloning is difficult. It's like taking the engine from a car you really like and putting it into another car. If things aren't connected right, your car won't go. To clone an animal, a scientist needs to copy the animal's DNA and place it into a host cell scientifically created to support the new DNA.
Once the DNA is inside the cell, scientists wait to see if the cell will grow and develop as a normal embryo. If it does, the embryo can be implanted into the host mother, where the embryo will flourish or abort. The difficulty of getting cloning to work is why cloning animals for food production would be exorbitant.
DC: How long have researchers been studying the cloning of animals?
Lucey: Research into cloning and the intermediate steps to get cloning to work have gone on for a long time. Early research began in the 1980s, but it wasn't until the creation of Dolly"" the sheep in the 1990s that large steps in cloning research started taking place.
DC: How did you become involved in studying the safety of food products from cloned animals?
Lucey: Several years ago companies became interested in the concept of cloning high value animals in the event that new technology might one day lead cloning to become cost-effective for food production. Animals were already being cloned but there were no FDA regulations on how to treat the food products from cloned animals. The FDA set out to find what, if any, differences there were between the milk and meat from cloned versus non-cloned animals. In the meantime, FDA asked these companies not to use milk from these animals for human consumption.
A company with cloned cows approached us and asked if we would be willing to test the milk samples of the animals. The goal was to test and see if there was anything abnormal in the milk, any red flags that should keep the milk out of the food supply. There was concern about what was in the milk and we certainly didn't want adults and children drinking cloned milk without knowing what was in it.
We tested all of the major components of milk samples (proteins, lipids and nutrient content) from a variety of breeds of cloned cows and found no difference between the cloned and non-cloned cows.
It is important to note there was variation in the amount of milk produced and the major components among the cloned cows. There is the common misconception that clones all look identical, like perfect cow robots performing exactly the same. This is not true.
Even though the clones may have identical genetic information, environmental factors will lead clones to appear and function differently. The same is true of fraternal (non-identical) twins.
DC: Are there any dangers to consuming cloned milk?
Lucey: To the best of my knowledge there is no reason to be concerned about consuming cloned milk. All the research out there shows cloned milk is safe. Remember, we are not manipulating the genes, so essentially you would expect the cloned milk to be the same as non-cloned milk. This is the reason FDA believes the milk from clones is safe.
It is difficult to even come up with a hypothetical situation where consuming cloned milk would be dangerous. If you move the engine from your favorite car to a new car and the car won't start, it doesn't work. Similarly, the cloned cell won't develop (and cloned animal would never have the opportunity to be used for food production).
DC: Does cloned milk taste the same?
Lucey: There have been no taste test studies on cloned milk because the FDA was in the process of assessing the safety of cloned food products. While we were testing it, I tasted it. To be honest, it tastes like regular milk.
DC: Are you at all concerned over cloned food products entering the U.S. food supply?
Lucey: I'm concerned about real problems. Contaminated foods entering the food supply, hamburgers with pathogenic E. coli - these are real problems that kill people every day and are major issues we know about. I don't see where the science is to say cloned food products are a problem.
DC: Why doesn't the FDA just require labels on cloned food products so people can choose or not choose cloned products on their own?
If the public is not well-informed about cloning, which the majority are not, how can they make an informed decision about cloned food products?
Lucey: I'm all for labeling in cases where food products contain serious risks for certain populations. However, in the case of labeling milk from cloned animals it would only cause more confusion. All the research says cloned food products are the same as non-cloned.
DC: What take-home message do you have for students regarding the recent FDA announcement?
Lucey: First, take a deep breath. Don't link all technologies together - genetic modification (when scientists manipulate genes to see how it affects food) and cloning (genetic copying) are separate techniques. Educate yourself about different technologies so you are able to judge risks for yourself. Based on scientific research to date, the risk of cloned food products is very low.
