Wed, Jan 16, 2008 (2 a.m.)

Food and Drug Administration officials declared Tuesday that meat and milk from cloned animals are safe for human consumption and will allow such products to enter the marketplace without labels identifying them as coming from clones.

Such products won’t be in supermarkets right away, the Associated Press reports, because the FDA and the U.S. Agriculture Department have asked producers to abide by a voluntary transition period for “allowing the marketplace to adjust.”

Cloned animals are more expensive than conventionally conceived livestock, the AP reports, so initially meat and milk are more likely to come from the offspring of clones rather than the clones themselves.

Consumer advocates and other critics say the FDA has failed to adequately protect consumers because the agency is not requiring producers to label meat or milk as coming from cloned animals or their offspring.

Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., sponsor of legislation passed last year that required the FDA to more closely study the safety of products from cloned animals, said the agency “has acted recklessly” and added that “if we discover a problem with cloned food after it is in our food supply and it’s not labeled (as being cloned), the FDA won’t be able to recall it.”

The FDA has said that producers of meat and milk that do not come from clones can label their foods as such.

We don’t think that is good enough. Products from cloned animals or their offspring should be clearly labeled as such, so that consumers who are concerned about the ethics and safety of cloning can avoid purchasing such foods if they wish.