Bio-Engineered Rice Uses Human Genes 417
gliph writes "Yahoo news has a piece about a small biogenetics firm that is using genetically engineered rice containing human genes to help fight diarrhea. From the article: 'Ventria's rice produces two human proteins found in mother's milk, saliva and tears, which help people hydrate and lessen the severity and duration of diarrhea attacks, a top killer of children in developing countries.'"
Fertile or unfertile, patented or free (Score:5, Interesting)
If it does, is he allowed to? May he actually plant that rice without a new license for next year? No kidding, some (very popular) sorts cannot be used anymore because the company holding the rights (yes, there is rights and patents on food. Go figure) doesn't allow using it anymore.
This malpractice is getting more and more common to make farmers dependent on industrial seeds.
So that's the questions I'd prefer to have answered. Not what the wonder-rice could be. I'd be interested in the question what it IS.
they should insert this technology up their... (Score:2, Interesting)
The necessity to eat certain foods could be overcome if this technology could be inserted directly into the human body, in addition to genetic modifications to help those with nut allergies etc. to overcome their problem. (Or at least in the next generation of children that they have...).
Re:Product's name: (Score:5, Interesting)
Are there any moslem or jewish
Re:Next Logical Step? (Score:2, Interesting)
If we're worried about robbing the thunder of the heavens of what makes humans special, then I don't think we've infringed on that. Perhaps we are walking in that direction, but I'm not sure this actually infringes there.
Long Pole in the Tent: Celliac Disease (Score:5, Interesting)
I've seen no study to verify mammary colostrum and human tears have any propolactic effect on villi, but paired with rice its a good starter. Celliac Disease causes the body's immune system to adversely react to a protein found in wheat products - gluten. Celliac's are able eat rice without the toxic effects of other grains.
There is no cure, no treatment, no therapy for Celliac Disease. The only thing that can be done is remove gluten from the diet. The damage to the villi can be reversed in most cases and health maintained with a disciplined gluten-free diet for Life.
The GM rice/human DNA engineered grain could only reverse the death rate in developing countries if the GM DNA provide an immunity. The villi are delicate structures which regenerate all the time in health people. They are wiped out when anyone gets diarhea. That's what diarhea is, loss of villi, medically.
If the GM rice passes immunity to the villi, they have a treatment for every 1:133 American's living with the disease. Not bad market.
Re:Product's name: (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't eat pork, not because of the "risks" (just clean up the stuff you use and cook everything through) nor because of some book, but because it tastes bad.
Just try to remember when you eat sausage: Theres nothing like minceing up an animal and stuff it into it's own intestines.
Re:Shut the fuck up. (Score:1, Interesting)
Yeah, I'd mod you way way down, not for calling 'bullshit', but for acting like an asshole and seriously missing the point and being angry about something in real life and taking it out on the poster. Fear mongering? He was implying the people should possibly be told it is genetically modified and let them decide. A bearded monster? To ask the questions? Things should be questioned, even the bad ones! The bad ones should have the easiest answers without the 'you cold hearted child killing bastard!' type of epithets and total point dodges in the response. My advice to you, bub, stick to the facts and leave the rest out or don't be surprised at the heavy metal pipe beatings you get from those you 'argue' with in person. Or wonder why people avoid you as much as they can. +4? shit..
My take on this is try to push for cleaner water with technology to prevent the problem in the first place rather than pushing to ease symptoms of a disorder with much more difficult technology. But of course I'm probably an evil bearded monster sonofabitch too that didn't RTFA.
Re:Product's name: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:These symptoms are caused by poverty (Score:5, Interesting)
The best example I have is the story my dad told me about the security guard at the church (yes 24x7 security or everything would be stolen). This man's 2 year old daughter got malaria from a mosquito bite. The resulting diarrhea made him desperate enough to take her to the hospital. The IV of fluids she got helped, but she died shortly after from the staph infection she got from the needle.
When my parents went to her funeral, they were SHOCKED at the size of the cemetary. It was for children only. Dad said he'd never seen such a huge cemetary - it was 5 miles across. Every grave marker had a number on it. The marker for the little girl they were there to bury was #278,xxx. That is a LOT of children.
I don't remember the exact statistics my dad quoted me, but something like half of all children in Mozambique die by the age of 5. It would be even easier to provide mosquito control pesticides (which work quite well next door in South Africa, no anti-malarials needed), and the cheap anti-malarial drugs in bulk.
I'm no expert, but I'm a parent. I really feel for the people in these countries. It wouldn't take much to improve their situation dramatically. The other side of that coin is the rampant corruption in most African nations, which is a big stumbling block to getting aid to the people. That's a subject for another day though.
Re:Ethics? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Old recipe for stopping diarrhea (Score:2, Interesting)
If take a minute to get the facts, and ask some questions, you will discover that rarely, if ever, do these developments help the poor, 3rd world nations or their citizens.
First, the facts:
-This technology in particular is being developed by a private, US-based CORPORATION. An entity with all the rights of a person but none of the responsiblity.
-The purpose of the corporation is to EARN money, to have REVENUE and PROFIT.
-Research and Development of complex (or even simple) Bio-engineered crops and products is EXPENSIVE, i.e. it COSTS MONEY.
-The results of this R&D WILL be patented and vigorously protected by the patent owner, the corporation that invested all that money in R&D.
-The corporation will, eventually, if it ever hopes to earn REVENUE and PROFIT, produce, market and SELL products based on this research, or license this technology to another corporation that is better able to produce, market and SELL said products.
So now, you have to ask some questions:
1. Who benefits from this research? Well, certainly, the corporation that owns the research and the patents derived from this research stands to benefit, but only if they actually get approval to SELL the product or license the related technologies to another corporation that is willing to pay for it. OK. Who else benefits? 3rd world countries? How? Do you really think this corporation will just GIVE away products or the technology itself to 3rd world nations in the name of humanitarian aid? HELL NO!! How do you make money by GIVING the technology away? You can't! I'm not saying that this corporation is evil just because they won't give their hard-earned technology away for free. I'm just pointing out how things work, especially in the capitalist global market.
2. Why is this technology being spun as "for the good of all humanity" or some such? The answer to this one is pretty simple: It is a pre-emptive strike against those who would speak against this technology. How? Well, anyone who argues against the technology will now be seen as a kook or a luddite that is 'rabidly anti-technology' and who 'doesn't understand' the potentially BILLIONS of LIVES that will be SAVED by this benevolent technology!! Sure, that will never happen but hey, it SOUNDS GOOD!! By the time the general population realizes that nobody but the corporation who owns the patent on this technology is benefiting, the genie will be out of the bottle.
And we didn't even touch on the other, more blatantly EVIL tactics that are used by some corporations in this industry. I'm giving Ventria the benfit of the doubt for now, because they're relativley small and new.
Again, I'm not saying that Ventria is intentionally screwing anyone, merely that it is dishonest to state that this technology (or any, similar technology developed by a corporation) is being developed with the best interests of the poor, 3rd world countires in mind.
Re:Product's name: (Score:4, Interesting)
As to your follow up,
You make halal questions sound very personal choice / decentralized
Islam is indeed quite decentralized. An Islamic scholar cannot say "trust me and do this and that" , but he has to justify in detail why he says a certain rule should be followed.
All rules in Islam are derived from a set of well known sources (Mainly The Quran and quotes of the prophet) and a set of complex rules of inference from those sources that take years to learn. A scholar's authority over a normal person comes not from his position but from his knowledge and expertise in this area.
If Islamic scholars were asked about the tomatoes with pig genes issue,they will likely fall into one of the three camps I mentioned . If the majority agrees on one answer then this will be the 'agreement of scientists' which is the nearest thing we have to an official stance. If they didn't agree, a Muslim would have to see how each scholar's opinion was justified and make his/her own choice (or play it safe and avoid the product, especially that it's trivially easy when the product is a given brand of tomato!).
there's a couple of central authorities for 'certifying' foods as kosher (one in the US somewhere, and one in Israel) Does Islam have an equivilant authority?
Yes. In the USA and Europe ( and certainly in other countries) there are Islamic organizations whose job is to determine what food is haram and what is halal. They even publish lists of common brand names and their haram/halal status (can't remember their names though ).
But Muslims do not see these as authorities. We see them as helpful people who did the research for us, and they're almost certainly more correct than someone who didn't do the same research.
Re:so why do you want to hurt them? (Score:2, Interesting)
It is not simply well-meaning idiots that focus on the short term. It is far more systemic - corruption is supported by the west, in fact BP last year wrote off 40% of its investment cost in a certain African nation as "Corruption". Yes, that is 40%. Massive. In response to Chinese interests in African oil, there is now a somewhat 'anything goes' strategy, which means corruption and 'stability' are here to stay, at the expense of conditions of those nations' populations. In particular, it is not just 'well-meaning idiots' that are causing problems, but planned greed, perhaps out of oil-peak fears, by corporations and governments alike.
I challenge the statement that the US developed into a modern economy devoid of meddling. Slave trade from Africa transported by English and other frigates? Help from the French in War of independence?
But more so I disagree with 'if we give them access to world markets and let them compete and develop freely'. First, we may need to subsidise the first African efforts to trade on a free market, given the already strong presence of cheap production in South East Asia, at this time, a lot of industries that sub-saharan African nations might become involved in are already dominated successfully by SE Asian nations; how can we get their foot in the door? It is worse than this currently though, because the WTO has legislation that says something like 97% of trade from Africa will be tariff free. Who's to say which are the remaining 3? Individual nations, so they can in fact pick only those industries which are competitive.
Also, there is a huge issue of malaria and HIV. I don't see the free market on it's own solving this. I agree that access to markets, in particular in the landlocked countries that have highest rates of HIV and malaria, and most stark poverty, is necessary, but I think the market on its own, without assistance, is not a cure-all for the economic malaise facing sub-saharan Africa.