FDA: Cloned Meat & Milk OK

Reuters

 

FDA approves cloned meat, milk: newspaper

Tue Jan 15, 2008 12:33am EST

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. Food and Drug Administration report finds that meat and milk from cloned animals is, for the most part, safe to eat, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday.

The newspaper said it had obtained a copy of a long-awaited, 968-page "final risk assessment," from the agency ahead of release.

It said FDA experts measured vitamins A, C, B1, B2, B6 and B12 as well as niacin, pantothenic acid, calcium, iron, phosphorous, zinc, fatty acids, cholesterol, fat, protein, amino acids and lactose in meat and milk from 600 cloned animals, including cattle and pigs.

Levels all looked normal.

The agency also found no health effects in animals fed meat and milk from cloned animals for more than three months.

"Food from cattle, swine, and goat clones is as safe to eat as that from their more conventionally-bred counterparts," the newspaper quotes the report as saying.

Last week, the European Food Safety Authority also approved the safety of meat and milk from cloned animals.

FDA officials have said the report would likely be released later on Tuesday.

The newspaper said the report concluded there was not enough information to rule on the safety of food from cloned sheep. It also said that food from newborn cloned cattle, which often are abnormal, "may pose some very limited human food consumption risk."