Genetically Modified Chicken, Available Soon in Your Grocer’s Freezer?
Would you tuck into a hamburger from a genetically modified cow resistant to mad cow disease?
An Associated Press story in today’s Journal indicates that the FDA may soon allow that to happen. According to the story, such food won’t be labeled as genetically modified unless it changes the final product, such as low cholesterol filet mignon (flown in by jet pack! Welcome to the future!).
But I do think this won’t fly with many consumers down the road. More people than ever are interested in where their food comes from, what kind of diet it had growing up, if it was treated humanely, and perhaps if it was trained in ballet, or taught Latin or given hot stone massages. So they’re certainly going to want to know if it’s genetically modified, even if it doesn’t have known health effects.
Companies will probably argue that genetically modified food won’t need labels just for that reason. And I wonder if this is similar to the debate over milk that comes from cows that have been given recombinant bovine growth hormone. Companies who don’t use milk from cows given growth hormone are quick to make a point of it on their labels, even if the FDA thinks the hormone is safe. And major buyers, like Wal-Mart, have moved away from buying milk from rbST-treated cows.
I like labels that err on the side of more rather than less. The FDA required milk producers to add a caveat to their hormone-free labels. It underscores that they’ve found no difference between milk with or without hormones. At least we have the option of knowing what kind of milk we’re buying.
If better living through science is really safe, what’s wrong with a label that gives us a little more information about what we eat?
