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UK. Cloned cow meat eaten
05.08.2010 11:16 "Agro Perspectiva" (Kyiv) —
Meat from the offspring of a cloned cow has entered the UK food chain and has already been eaten, said Britains food watchdog.
The revelation has stirred controversy over whether such products are ethical.
Under European rules, suppliers are supposed to obtain a licence before selling products from cloned animals.
However, Britains Food Standards Agency (FSA) hastened to add that there is no suggestion that the cloned animal products posed a health risk to consumers.
«While there is no evidence that consuming products from healthy clones, or their offspring, poses a food safety risk, meat and products from (them) are considered novel foods and would therefore need to be authorised before being placed on the market,» FSA said.
Two bulls born in Britain have been traced to embryos harvested from a cloned cow in the US. One was slaughtered in July last year.
«Meat from this animal entered the food chain and will have been eaten,» the agency said.
The second bull was slaughtered last month. Since then steps have been put in place to make sure the meat did not enter the human food chain.
In 2008, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the sale of food from clones and their offspring.
FDA said the products were indistinguishable from those of non-cloned animals.
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But the European parliament have recently voted to remove food from cloned animals from a list of approved products.
They ruled that a novel food application must be made before it can be sold.
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