FDA predicts no significant environmental impact from GM mosquitoes

[sue4e3]

The FDA has taken a step in the process of deciding whether to allow the first test release in the United States of genetically modified mosquitoes to fight diseases such as those caused by the Zika virus.

FDA reviewers on March 11 released a draft statement predicting that a short-term release of male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes engineered to fail as fathers would make “no significant impact” on the environment. The England-based company Oxitec developed the OX513A mosquitoes to shrink wild populations by siring offspring that won’t live to adulthood. Brazil has approved their use, and the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District is considering a short-term experiment at Key Haven.
https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/science-ticker/fda-predicts-no-significant-environmental-impact-gm-mosquitoes?tgt=nr

[idea5]

1. I want to believe this is true...

but can't help but think that this is the beginning of a sci-fi movie where the mosquitos take over. Very interesting science though.

[Kip Humphrey]

2. "FDA predicts" ...Why does this phrase cause me to feel so uneasy???

I don't want the FDA to predict, I want them to confirm safety and efficacy.

[sue4e3]

3. agreed

[revbones]

4. They didn't predict any problems with klebsiella planticola either that I recall

The Deadly Genetically Engineered Bacteria that Almost Got Away: A
Cautionary Tale

In the early 1990s a European genetic engineering company was preparing to field test and then commercialize on a major scale a genetically engineered soil bacteria called Klebsiella planticola. The bacteria had been tested--as it turns out in a careless and very unscientific mannner--by scientists working for the biotech industry and was believed to be safe for the environment. Fortunately a team of independent scientists, headed by Dr. Elaine Ingham of Oregon State University, decided to run their own tests on the gene-altered Klebsiella planticola. What they discovered was not only startling, but terrifying-- the biotech industry had created a biological monster--a genetically engineered microorganism that would kill all terrestrial plants. After Ingham's expose, of course the gene-altered Klebsiella planticola was never commercialized. But as Ingham points out, the lack of pre-market safety testing of other genetically altered organisms virtually guarantees that future biological monsters will be released into the environment. Moreover it's not only genetic engineering that poses a mortal threat to our soil ecology, the soil food web, as Ingham calls it. Chemical-intensive agriculture is slowly but surely poisoning our soil and our drinking water as well.

http://online.sfsu.edu/repstein/GEessays/Klebsiellaplanticola.html