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Re: [SANET-MG] RNAi kills



Hi Dale,
The main point is that RNAi should not be assumed safe until it is proved dangerous, it should be presumed to kill anybody exposed to it until it is proved safe. In the mouse experiment mice exposed top too much RNAi just turned up their little feet and died, would you wish that on children?.RNAi is often active between widely different organisms. For that reason RNAi constructs need to tested and cannot be deemed "substantially equivalent". Turning to C5 Honey Sweet plum, they are know to resist viruses through RNAi which is continually produced in the plums whether they meet viruses or not.The US EPA SAP panel reached a typically sappy conclusion about the C5 plum. They judged the plum was safe to eat because people had been eating virus infected plums a long time. Clearly that conclusion ignored the fact that C5 makes no virus protein(the virus protein gene in C5 produced no protein) and plums making antivirus RNAi would not contain virus at all.Such sappy reasoning may make good business sense at the cost off the health of people.
sincerely,joe cummins

Dale Wilson wrote:
Joe and everyone,

Safety concerns raised over RNA interference
Simon Frantz

High doses kill mice, but researchers maintain confidence in gene-silencing method

Warnings: As more is understood about the gene-silencing
capabilities of RNA interference, more issues are being raised
about potential safety (snip)

I am curious what people on SANET think of therapeutic use of RNAi (as
opposed to constitutive use of transgenes to perform gene-silencing). In RNAi therapy, double-stranded RNA is introduced. This engages very
powerful, primordial anti-viral mechanisms in the animal or plant,
which suppress expression of homologous or near-homogous RNA.  This can
be used to "knock-down" genes that are normally expressed in the plant
or animal.  Here is an explanation:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RNA_interference

RNAi is probably the most exciting thing going on in biology.  Aside
from being a great research tool, RNAi may hold the key to a cure for
AIDS, and many other problems.  It is not necessarily a germ line
(heritable) intervention, but can be used therapeutically.  It blurs
the line between pharmaceuticals and genetic engineering.

Dale

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