Take action against GE salmon - Tell the FDA to ban it now!

Tuesday, November 20, 2012 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Tags: GE salmon, AquAdvantage, FDA

(NaturalNews) It has been more than two years since the biotechnology company AquAdvantage first petitioned the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to approve its genetically-engineered (GE) salmon AquaBounty for human consumption, and the agency still has not given the "Frankenfish" the green light, thanks in large part to continued public pressure against its approval.

But now that nearly 50 percent of AquAdvantage has been purchased by another biotechnology company with strong ties to Monsanto, it is clear that revived industry pressures will be pushing more strongly than ever to get this GE salmon approved, which means the public needs to step up its game now to demand that the FDA immediately ban this dangerous fish from the food supply.

You can access and sign a petition calling on the FDA to ban GE salmon here:
http://action.foodandwaterwatch.org

Monsanto-aligned Intrexon to help AquAdvantage get GE salmon approved

According to Food & Water Watch (FWW), a biotechnology company known as Intrexon recently purchased about 48 percent of the nearly-bankrupt AquAdvantage, which has been struggling to stay afloat as its GE salmon project has been slowly sinking.

Intrexon's current board of directors includes Robert B. Shapiro, former vice president, president, and CEO of Monsanto, as well as former head of the NutraSweet subsidiary of GD Searle & Company, the creator of aspartame. The company's current senior vice president and head of animal science, Thomas Kasser, also worked at Monsanto for 20 years prior to coming on board at Intrexon, where he helped develop and promote the controversial GE growth hormone rBGH.

Other key Intrexon figures include former executives from pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, for instance, and fast food chain McDonald's, as well as many others with considerable industry experience in successfully rushing toxic chemical poisons and untested genetically-modified (GM) foods through the federal regulatory approval process.

It does not take a rocket scientist, in other words, to see that Intrexon was strategically brought on board to promote AquaBounty because the company has the expertise needed to get GE salmon forcibly approved against the will of the people.

GE salmon unsafe, unproven to provide any tangible benefits

Scientifically; however, AquaBounty has been shown to produce abnormally high levels of insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF), a hormone that has been linked to a variety of human cancers. This is one reason among many why GE salmon has yet to make it to American dinner plates.

The Frankenfish's original creator has also never definitively shown that GE salmon legitimately grows more quickly than natural salmon, which was one of the primary excuses offered as to why the world needs GE salmon in the first place. Similarly, AquaBounty has never been proven safe for human consumption, which means no matter how you look at it, there is no legitimate or justified reason to introduce this GMO into the food supply.

But with a fresh infusion of corporate prowess from Intrexon, GE salmon could end up hitting grocery store meat cases in a matter of months, that is unless the public speaks up now to oppose its approval. FWW has created an easy petition form by which you can demand that the FDA prohibit the world's first GE fish meat from being commercially produced for human consumption. You can access and sign that petition here: http://action.foodandwaterwatch.org

Sources for this article include:

http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org

http://www.dna.com/content.aspx?ContentID=1415

http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org