Announcing Science in Society 18

[Guest guest]

The Institute of Science in Society

Science Society Sustainability

http://www.i-sis.org.uk

 

General Enquiries sam

Website/Mailing List press-release

ISIS Director m.w.ho

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Announcing Science in Society 18

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To order your copy, please visit the ISIS online store

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/onlinestore.php#latest , or print out a flyer

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/downloads/SIS18flyer.pdf (with attached order form)

 

From the Editor

 

Dozens of prominent scientists have staged a spectacular rebellion against the

pro-GM establishment, and set up an Independent Science Panel (ISP) to conduct

their own review on GM, having completely lost confidence in the official

national review and public debate. They are fed up at being sidelined and

suppressed, and anxious that the world should make the right choice between GM

and sustainable agriculture.

 

The result of their deliberation, a handsomely produced report, The Case for a

GM- Free Sustainable World, was published electronically on the ISIS website to

coincide with the official launch of the ISP, just ahead of the official UK GM

public debate. The draft report was sent to the Philippines to be submitted to

the president in support of the hunger strike against the commercial approval of

Bt maize, which has been in progress since April 22. The ISP launch was a great

success. You can see some of the pictorial highlights at the back cover of this

issue.

 

Promises and threats in globalising traditional medicines

 

The global market for herbal medicine is enormous and rapidly growing, and this

has already led to unsustainable over-harvesting of wild resources in the Third

World and North America, and adversely affecting people who depend on gathering

wild herbs to supplement their income, not to mention those who depend on cheap

and affordable traditional medicines for healthcare.

 

As China is joining the WTO, she is keen to capture a slice of the lucrative

global market in herbal medicines, but this is creating a host of problems, and

perhaps also opportunities. Will the need to standardise traditional medicines

increase the cost so much that they will no longer be affordable for the

ordinary Chinese people? Will over-exploitation of natural plants and animals

increase the threat of extinctions, especially as Western-trained scientists are

mining traditional herbs for ‘miracle cures’ for cancer and other diseases of

rich nations and patenting them? Will the over-zealous attempt to modernise

Chinese medicine destroy the very essence of traditional Chinese medicine? Or

will something unique come out of the confrontation between eastern and western

knowledge systems?

 

The Chinese tradition belongs with all holistic health traditions of many, if

not all, indigenous communities, and China will be closely watched by the

developing world. Read on to find out how China may find a solution.

 

SARS, bio-terrorism & GM

 

Panic over the SARS epidemic spread just as the world was in the frenzy of war

over ‘weapons of mass destruction’. Since September 11, 2001, governments have

wanted to ban the publication of sensitive scientific research results, and a

group of major life sciences editors and authors has recently agreed. There is

even a suggestion that an international body should be set up to police research

and publication. But the arrival of the SARS epidemic added even further

confusion. The journal Nature called Mother Earth the " ultimate terrorist " ,

while the New Scientist decries the fact that although the international

community has weapons inspectors that can force entry into a country on the

slightest hint that it is harbouring bioweapons, there is no equivalent body to

take control, even though " the disease may be vastly more dangerous " .

 

And in the weeks following the identification of SARS as a coronavirus, but

unrelated to any previously known, and its sequence obtained, those who have

been genetically engineering coronaviruses in the laboratory suddenly found

themselves in the limelight, feted and wooed by biotech companies in search of

new vaccines.

 

But still no one is asking if genetic engineering may have something to do with

creating the virus. Read on, for some of the clues.

 

GM science war escalates

 

Britain’s GM science war really escalated when environment minister Michael

Meacher gave an exclusive interview to The Ecologist published in March 2003,

saying that GM technology is not necessary to solve world hunger and could prove

dangerous over the longer term, thereby putting his job on the line. I think it

was that as much as anything else, which galvanised the scientists; it certainly

did for me, sufficiently to initiate the Independent Science Panel.

 

We are not alone. Sir Tom Blundell, scientist appointed by the Prime Minister to

chair the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution in 1998, attacked the GM

Science Review in a letter to Professor David King, the government’s Chief

Scientific Adviser heading the scientific review. Blundell sees " a real danger

that their conclusion [to approve commercial growing of GM crops] will already

have been cast - or at least the public would be justified in perceiving that to

be the case. "

 

But Blundell’s views are obviously not shared by the Royal Society, which

appears to be lending more than a helping hand to promote GM and suppress

critics; nor the government’s scientific advisory committees on GM, which have

effectively given the green light to commercial growing of all GM crops,

presumably including the terminator oilseed rape in the farm scale evaluations

that spreads both male sterile suicide genes and herbicide tolerance.

 

Our government’s science advisors have betrayed public trust, and have been

caught playing fast and loose with scientific evidence.

 

Biosafety matters

 

Joe Cummins exposes the gaping holes in current biosafety regulations that led

to GM microbes being released over the past six years in North America without

public awareness; potentially allergenic papaya being approved; transgenic meat

on people’s dinner tables; and pharm crops containing cytokines that are known

to suppress the immune system, induce sickness and central nervous system

toxicity, as well as interferon alpha, which is reported to cause dementia,

neurotoxicity and mood and cognitive side effects. Worse yet, there is a move to

feed cytokines to chickens in place of antibiotics, and we may well end up with

demented as well as poisonous chickens.

 

Rethinking health, biology, ethics, and more

 

As usual, SiS offers you a rich selection of stimulating mental foods to ward

off the gloom and doom. David Bellamy on how herbs keep you healthy and Cummins

on how organic food helps fight cancer for a start. Then, Edward Goldsmith,

founding editor of The Ecologist and the world’s foremost environmentalist,

presents a thorough critique of generations of evolutionists from Thomas Huxley

to Richard Dawkins, and persuades us to adopt a ‘biospheric ethic’; Peter

Saunders elaborates further on why the precautionary principle is science-based

and Mae-Wan Ho punctures the scientific myth that launched a thousand companies

and enthuses over the ‘biology of least action’.

 

Contents

From the Editor

ISP Special

Meacher at Launch of Independent Science Panel

Scientists Rebelling with A Cause

SARS, Bio-terrorism & GM

Bio-Terrorism & SARS*

Death by DNA Shuffling*

SARS and Genetic Engineering?*

Globalising

Globalising *

‘Miracle’ Chinese Cancer Cure*

TCM in Contemporary China*

TCM & Contemporary Western Science*

Rethinking Health

Herbalert to the Rescue*

Organic Agriculture Helps Fight Cancer*

GM Debate Special

GM Science Review Fixed?

Royal Society Under Fire

Science Advisors Abusing Public Trust*

Science Advisors Abusing Science*

Chronicle of An Ecological Disaster Foretold*

Rethinking Ethics

Towards a Biospheric Ethic*

Biosafety Alerts

Pharming Cytokines in Transgenic Crops*

Allergenic GM Papaya Scandal*

Transgenic Meat Scandal*

GM Microbes Invade North America*

Special Article

The Precautionary Principle is Science-based*

SiS Review

Biology of Least Action

Health Genomics?

Parliament Faults Medical Research Council & DNA BioBank

SiS Lecture

The Myth that Launched a Thousand Companies

 

To order your copy, please visit the ISIS online store

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/onlinestore.php#latest , or print out a flyer

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/downloads/SIS18flyer.pdf (with attached order form)

 

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telephone: [44 20 8643 0681] [44 20 7383 3376] [44 20 7272 5636]

 

General Enquiries sam

Website/Mailing List press-release

ISIS Director m.w.ho

 

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