[MPWG] herbal remedies associated with heart drugs

[Terressentials]

Thanks so much for posting this bio-engineering update, Gena.

The continued reports about the genetic mutilation and corporate
exploitation of everyone's botanicals is outrageous on many levels.
I'm pretty disgusted with the actions and inactions of large
corporations and regulators right now.  I'm also not seeing how we can
stop this madness, and it makes me frustrated, sad and apprehensive
about our future.

And so it goes...

Regards,

Diana




----- Original message -----
From: "Gena Fleming" <genafleming at gmail.com>
To: "Jean Giblette" <hfg at capital.net>
Cc: mpwg at lists.plantconservation.org Date: Wed, 3 Feb 2010 22:25:07 -
    0600 Subject: Re: [MPWG] herbal remedies associated with heart drugs

I'm glad this article has inspired so many comments, which I have
enjoyed reading.  It really is important not to let so much
misinformation and inuendo go unchallenged.

I agree with Jean's comments about perception problems and paradigm
shifts. But I would like to emphasize that the current tide is moving
swiftly from chemical pharmaceuticals that were synthesized from
petrochemical byproducts to the development of transgenic plants to
produce drugs.  And this shift really increases the risks.

The chemical synthesis of drugs in the past did not really impede our
access to herbs.  GM medicinal plants do, because their development
threatens to contaminate the ancestral integrity of these important
plants.  They also pose other ecological risks that affect other
organisms and soil fertility.


Transgenic plants are being engineered to increase "active" compouds,
standardize them,  increase production efficiencies (including cloning),
decrease "undesired" components, or address other industrial
preferences. For example, China is developing a transgenic Jujube with
the antisense gene. (
http://www.cababstractsplus.org/abstracts%5C/Abstract.aspx?AcNo=20043052888
). The purpose of antisense technology is to delay fruiting, so the
onset of fruiting can be controlled by chemical application.  It's
similar to terminator technology.

I think most biomedical physicians, pharmacists, and researchers have
good intent.  They're just doing their job.  The devil is in the system.

In the United States, two events really attached the carrot to the
stick; both occurred in 1980.  1)  The Supreme Court upheld the right to
patent living organisms; 2) the Bayh Dole Act allowed universities
operating with public funds to form partnerships with corporations.

So our taxpayer money is paying for research to develop transgenic
organisms which can be patented and owned by multinational
pharmaceutical companies or agribusiness.  Multinational corporations
are now funding and directing university research.  The research follows
the money.  The universities get a cut of the royalties.

Now, more than ever, it is important to promote not simply the use of
"medicinal plants", but the validity of indigenous knowledge. Indigenous
science offers a more complex, integrative, contemplative worldview that
attempts to cooperate rather than conquer Nature.  It is not simply the
therapeutic modalities and substances of these traditional systems which
need to be adopted.  It is necessary to have a pluralistic medical
society, even a pluralistic scientific society, with more appropriate,
integrative research methodologies, and research funded for the public
good, not private enterprise.

In such a world, it should be inconceivable that life could ever be
owned by a corporation.

best regards,

Gena