Mr J Rowland, obviously an important beekeeper of NY, suggested
last October that a tetracycline-resistance gene may have been inserted
into GM crops in the course of their 'engineering'.   The idea thus arose
that resistance to tetracycline might have passed from such crops to
_Bacillus larvae_, the primary pathogen in AFB.

        I did not state this, nor did I have any opinion one way or the other.
        I was unaware until a couple days ago that the Rowland letter had
already been on Bee-L; when I learned that it had, I was fully content that
it not be re-posted here.

        I have now been able to enlist the help of an actual expert
gene-tamperer  -  which I am not  -  to look into this question.
Here is the response:

>I did not find any scientific literature mentioning tetracycline and field
>released Roundup-ready crops.
>But I did find one patent and
>several references to laboratory experiments that use Tetracycline
>resistance as the marker.
>Verifying that any commercial GM corn or soybeans
>had this gene has not been possible with the brief search I conducted.
>
>Thus I found nothing to prove that Tetracycline has been used in the major
> released GMOs.
>
>http://www.uspto.gov/patft/index.html
>
>United States Patent     5,731,179
>Komari ,   et al.     March 24, 1998


        This is the most reliable evidence we are likely to get soon on
this question.
        It is worth remarking that patents are routinely granted for ideas
that the patent office believes would not work if tried in practice.  (It
has to be a blatant breach of scientific law, e.g. perpetual motion
machines, to get rejected on grounds of infeasibility.)  Most folk are
surprised when they learn of this, but the reasons are not hard to see.  It
is impractical for the Pat Ossif to get involved in actual testing.

        I therefore believe:
                A tetracycline-resistance gene has not been used in the
'engineering' of current GM crops, and therefore there is no reason to
think that any such crops have contributed to increase of tetracycline
resistance in AFB.


        This topic has been instructive  -  in some useful and some
fruitless, needlessly unpleasant, ways.

1  Existence of a patent does not prove the idea is feasible let alone that
it has been implemented.  (The 'terminator' patent envisaging sterile seed
is perhaps the most important example  -  I have studied that patent and I
don't believe it will ever work commercially, and it certainly has not been
put into commercial effect.)
2  It was fair enough for Mr Rowland to raise the question.  It is also
fair enough to quote him; those who do should not be accused of having
thereby made any assertion themselves.  I had never heard of the idea that
tetracycline-resistance had yet been deployed in any commercial GM crop,
and it is mischievous to accuse me of having said so.
3  Beekeepers are not going to be able to avoid discussion of GM.  It is
going to impinge on us time & time again, whether we like it nor not.  The
inherent complexity of the subject, and the dominant role of PR agents in
generating rumours & falsehoods on the subject, make it especially
important to be very careful about who said what on it.

R

-
Robt Mann
consultant ecologist
P O Box 28878   Remuera, Auckland 1005, New Zealand
                (9) 524 2949