Chinese Researchers Claim Human/Rabbit Hybrid

Chinese researchers claimed in August to have created the first human/rabbit hybrid embryo.

The researcher was carried out at Shanghai Second Medical University and details about the research was published in Cell Research, a bimonthly peer reviewed journal of the Shanghai Institute of Cell Biology.

The researchers claim they fused skin cells from a number of human source with rabbit cells that had most of their rabbit DNA removed. According to the researchers, 400 of the hybrids grew into early embryos and more than 100 survived to become blastocysts.

There are many good reasons, however, to be skeptical that the researchers actually managed to create hybrid embryos.

According to a United Press International story, the report on this research had been submitted and rejected by several more reputable journals over the past two years. The study has been rejected for publication because both the draft and the version published in Cell Research omit data that would make it possible to confirm that the researchers actually resulted in embryonic cells.

And, as UPI tactfully puts it, “researchers in China have gained a reputation for making bold claims about cloning and stem cells that, all too often, prove false.”

Sources:

Scientists Doubt Chinese Claim of Rabbit-Human Clone. United Press International, August 15, 2003.

Cloning yields human-rabbit hybrid embryo. Rick Weiss, Washington Post, August 14, 2003.

Vegetarian Admits Joy Over BSE

Vegetarian Rani Sheen opens an op-ed for Eye Weekly about the BSE/vCJD scare thusly,

As a lifelong vegetarian, I can’t help but feel perversely jovial about the Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE, or Mad Cow disease) crisis in the Canadian beef industry.

. . .

The mechanics and demands of meat industries are selfish, without concern for animal or human suffering, and ultimately unsustainable. If the threat of BSE can give people a scare, and a chance to reflect on the many problems inherent in consuming the products of meat farming, then bring it on. And now I feel too vegetarian for words, so I will go quietly back to my (disease-free) salad, where I belong.

I cannot imagine many other people admitting to feeling even perverse joy over the deaths of more than 100 people. It must take a special sort of person to maintain such high standards.

Source:

The bright side of Mad Cow. Rani Sheen, Eye Weekly, August 21, 2003.

Another Clueless Activist on PETA's Holocaust Nonsense

Sometimes it is amazing to see just how clueless animal rights activists can be. Here’s another letter, this time from animal rights activist Nancy Pennington, in response to an op-ed run by the Spokesman-Review (Washington) criticizing PETA’s “Holocaust On Your Plate” campaign (emphasis added),

Doug Clark says he has interviewed “several survivors” (unnamed) of the Holocaust in his “PETA stoops to new low with exhibit” (Aug. 7) piece.

I wonder if he has interviewed Elie Wiesel, probably the most outspoken and eloquent survivor of the Holocaust or the Nobel Prize-winning writer Issac Bashevis Singer, whose concept was the impetus for PETA’s campaign.

Both of these humanitarians liken the treatment of animals raised for food to the Holocaust and support PETA’s efforts to educate people about the similarities of these horrors.

If Clark finds this campaign offensive, I find his trite and glib dismissal of many prominent Jews unconscionable.

Earth-to-Nancy: Wiesel has publicly stated that PETA’s comparison of the killing animals for food and the Holocaust is “wrong,” and Wiesel was angered that PETA used a photo that included him as a young prisoner at Buchenwald (where Wiesel’s father died).

Can anyone guess how much respect PETA granted this vegetarian Nobel Prize winner? (Hint, PETA spokespersons told at least one newspaper that the idea of apologizing to Wiesel for using his image had never come up).

Source:

Prominent Jews agree with PETA. Nancy Pennington, Letter-to-the-editor, Spokesman-Review (Washington), August 17, 2003.

India Moves Closer to Ban on Cow Slaughter

In August, India’s cabinet agreed to bring before its Parliament a bill that would ban the slaughter of cows throughout that nation.

Cows, of course, are considered sacred by Hindus and India has experienced waves of Hindu nationalism recently with, as the BBC put it, “the country’s two main political parties . . . battling over which one is the more ‘Hindu.'”

The slaughter of cows is already banned in most Indian states, but persists in Kerala, West Bengal, and seven other Indian states that have significant non-Hindu populations (40 percent of the population in Kerala, for example, is Muslim or Christian).

The BBC cites one example of intersection between Hindu extremism and government policy over cows,

Cows are also revered by many in India who believe some cow products have curative powers.

Scientists at the Centre for Medicinal Plants in Lucknow say distilled cow urine enhances the effects of any medicine and is used in traditional Indian medicine along with dung and fat.

Many companies including the VHP have started selling cow urine for 10 rupees ($0.20) in some parts of the country.

A practice, by the way, that is explicitly endorsed by Minister for Human Resources Development Murali Manohar Joshi.

Sources:

India targets cow slaughter. Jyotsna Singh, The BBC, August 11, 2003.

Researchers Develop Method to Produce Antibodies Quickly in Mice

In the September 2003 issue of Nature Biotechnology University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas describe a new procedure they’ve developed to speed up the production of antibodies in mice as well as producing higher quality antibodies.

Center director Stephen Johnston led a team of researchers in the 1990s that first demonstrated genetic immunization, and this new research builds on the earlier discovery.

Traditionally, animals such as mice will produce antibodies after being exposed to a specific protein. So-called genetic immunization achieves the same results by injecting the gene for the protein into the animal (in this case, mice).

The newly announced technique uses the antigen gene the researchers want to target, as well as modifying a gene that controls an immune system signaling compound.

The upshot is that not only do the mice pump put the desired antibody quickly, but almost any antibody can be produced this way. In a press release, Johnston said,

A surprising result [of the research] was that we could even make mice make antibodies to their own proteins. We think this system could be used to make antibodies to all the proteins in the genome. We hope these antibodies will contribute to discoveries that drive new advances in disease treatment.

Sources:

Mice become high-output antibody factories. Reuters, August 11, 2003.

Faster method for creating antibodies in mice discovered by UT Southwestern researchers. Press Release, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, August 11, 2003.

Minnesota County's Restriction on Feedlot Information Upheld

On July 31, a state official upheld a policy by Nobles County, Minnesota that raises a number of roadblocks to access information about feedlots in the county.

The Nobles County Commission approved a policy that adds additional requirements for people to meet if they want a copy of the comprehensive list of the 514 feedlots in the county. Individuals must submit a written request for the list, wait five days, pay $250, and retrieve the list in person.

The changes are in response to an April 2003 incident in which an animal rights activist trespassed on a feedlot in Nicollet County in order to photograph the site.

Commissioner of Administration Brian Lamb’s review of the policy largely upheld it with minor changes. The policy originally required individuals requesting the list to identify themselves, which Lamb overruled. The policy also originally said the list would be given to individuals only in printed format, but Lamb ruled that unless there was additional expense in doing so, the county should provide the list in electronic format as well if it were requested. Lamb also said that the county would have to prove that the $250 fee was necessary to cover its expenses — as it claims — should someone requesting the list demand such proof.

Steve Brake, president of the Minnesota State Cattlemen’s Association, wants the state to go further and designate information about feedlots as “security information” that the state would not disclose to the public. Brake told the Worthington Daily Globe (Minnesota),

In the world we live in today, food is important to our national security. We have to start looking at ways to protect it . . . We have to be realistic. Terrorists are going to start looking at our food.

The full text of Lamb’s advisory opinion is available here.

Source:

State upholds Nobles County feedlot policy. Franny White, Worthington Daily Globe (Minnesota), August 5, 2003.

Minnesota Department of Administration Advisory Opinion:03-025, July 31, 2003.