First, from the Washington Post: Researchers have had to shut a South African AIDS vaccine trial developed by Merck & Co; they started warning hundreds of clinical trial volunteers that a highly touted experimental vaccine they received in recent months might make them more, not less, likely to contract HIV. The full article here.
Secondly, another reason to become a vegetarian -- from Wired, the inside scoop on how cloned meat (and milk) is filtering its way into the food chain and onto on your dinner table. The author talks to one of the farmers about the health problems that his cloned pig offspring have suffered: "Within weeks of delivery in September 2002, the first piglet got sick and died. Another dropped dead two months later. A few days before Christmas, Earnhart walked into his heated barn at feeding time and spotted his last two piglets belly-up in the straw. The cause of death was apparently their identical, adult- size ulcers...[The demise] may have resulted from a well-known, poorly understood side effect of somatic-cell nuclear transfer called sudden death syndrome." Access the rest of the article here.Let's hope the rest of the week brings better news.
1 comment:
Did you hear the one about the glowing shrimp?
I am very distressed at the complete reversal of burden of proof in these food cases where safety is assumed and labeling is vetoed for fear of people not buying certain items. It reminds me of the NASA cover-up of the airline safety study data for fear that "people would be afraid of flying."
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