By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar

Super Chicken strutted a step closer to the dinner table.

The government said it will start considering proposals to sell genetically
engineered animals as food, a move that could lead to faster-growing fish,
cattle that can resist mad cow disease or perhaps heart-healthier eggs laid
by a new breed of chickens.

The rules will also apply to drugs and other medical materials from
genetically engineered animals, a field with explosive potential.

U.S. supermarkets currently sell no meat from genetically engineered
animals. But a Boston-area company called Aqua Bounty Technologies hopes to
win approval next year for its faster-growing salmon and make the fish
available by 2011. "It tastes just like any other farm-raised salmon," said
vice chairman Elliot Entis, who has sampled it.

Reaction from consumer groups was mixed. They welcomed the government's
decision to regulate genetically altered animals, but they cautioned that
crucial details remain to be spelled out. For example, the Food and Drug
Administration does not plan to require that all genetically engineered
meat, poultry and fish be labeled as such. It would be labeled only if there
was a change in the final product, such as low-cholesterol filet mignon.

"They are talking about pigs that are going to have mouse genes in them, and
this is not going to be labeled?" said Jean Halloran, director of food
policy for Consumers Union. "We are close to speechless on this." Consumers
Union publishes Consumer Reports magazine.

Nonetheless, Gregory Jaffe, who heads the biotechnology project at the
Center for Science in the Public Interest called the FDA's move a "good
first step."

"This is the first time the federal government is announcing a comprehensive
regulatory system that addresses the concerns from these animals," said
Jaffe. "But it may not have addressed all the environmental concerns."

What would happen if a genetically engineered animal escaped and started
reproducing with wild animals of the same species? asked Jaffe. The FDA said
it would address that issue.

On Thursday, the FDA released a proposed legal framework for how it would
resolve such questions as whether the altered animals are safe for human
consumption and whether they pose any serious environmental risk. FDA
officials said they were focusing on animals that will be used as food, or
to produce medications that would then be consumed by people or by other
animals. The agency is not interested in reviewing genetically engineered
mice already widely used in lab experiments.

"Genetic engineering of animals is here and has been here for some time, "
said Larisa Rudenko, a science policy adviser with the FDA's veterinary
medicine center. "We intend to provide a rigorous, risk-based regulatory
path for developers to follow to help ensure public health and the health of
animals."

Genetic engineering is already widely used in agriculture to produce
higher-yielding or disease-resistant crops. But it's unclear how consumers
will react to altered animals, even if they come with a government seal of
approval.

Genetically engineered ? or GE ? animals are not clones, which the FDA has
already said are safe to eat. While clones are exact copies of an animal,
genetically engineered animals are manipulated by scientists to bring about
a change in their characteristics. In years past, this was done by
crossbreeding animals with desirable traits.

GE animals are created when scientists insert a gene from one species of
animal into the DNA of another animal to reprogram some of its
characteristics. For example, fish could be made to grow faster, or pigs
might be re-engineered to produce less waste.

To engineer Aqua Bounty's faster-growing salmon, scientists took a snippet
of DNA from an eel-like fish and stitched it into the genes of salmon.
Normally, Atlantic salmon produce growth hormone only in the summer months.
But with the change, salmon produce growth hormone all year long, allowing
them to grow to full size in about 18 months instead of three years, Entis
said.

"This is like tuning up your car," he said. GE salmon would be kept in
enclosed pens, to prevent their escape into the wild, and sterilized to keep
them from reproducing.

While the introduction of GE animals by food companies will probably get the
most attention from the public, it's the pharmaceutical industry that seems
poised to reap the greatest benefits.

Barbara Glenn, an animal science expert with the Biotechnology Industry
Organization, said research is under way that could lead to the development
of vaccines, transplant organs, replacement tissues, and other medically
useful materials from genetically engineered animals.

For example, one company is experimenting with GE cows to produce human
antibodies against such diseases as smallpox and pandemic flu. Another is
trying to produce a pig liver that would be suitable for transplanting into
a human patient.

Glenn said there is currently only one drug on the market derived from a
genetically engineered animal, and it is not approved in the U.S. Available
in Europe, the medication is an anti-blood clotting factor produced from the
milk of GE goats.

"We are issuing this draft guidance now because the technology has evolved
to a point where the commercialization of these animals is no longer beyond
the horizon," said Randall Lutter, FDA deputy commissioner for policy. The
agency's proposal will be open for public comment for 60 days.

www.checkbiotech.org