Is Chicken and Egg making our children infertile and impotent?
Broiler chickens that are engineered to be "meat birds" as distinct from "laying birds" Broiler eggs are engineered to be fully / partially infertile. Isn't there an imminent possibility of the infertility of the meat and eggs affecting the person whose food habits include chicken and eggs?
Is there any research done on this topic?
Or on the effect of fruits, vegetables and pulses produced out of infertile farm seeds?
( In nature a seed sprouts into a plant which produces seeds. Commerical Farming uses seeds from seed companies who produce engineered seeds that sprout into plants that DO NOT produce seeds )
Is there on the effect of eating fruits and vegetables grown from such infertile seeds?
Clarification added June 11, 2008:
Some resources about Broiler chickens, though there is not much of information about daughter-chickens* whose reproductivity is controlled by genetic engineering. (* - The term daughter-chickens is coined to denote chickens hatched out of eggs laid by the "parent stock chickens) There is not much information about eggs laid by the "laying-birds". These eggs are usually engineered not to hatch?
http://greenfield.fortunecity.com/garden/156/broilers.html
There is an interesting movie starring Jude Law directed by David Cronnerberg "eXistenZ" which has a surrealistic theme of a Virtual Game within a Virtual Game. There is a scene in the movie that takes place in a restuaurant where Jude Law is served meat from "excotic new species" - animals or birds? without a head or with multiple heads. Today's poultry engineers the birds to have stronger legs, fleshy bodies, controlled reproduction etc. ), smaller intenstines, with the idea of making optimizing prime-meat in chicken. Are we far away from engineering chickens without a head and tail because nobody eats them?
Clarification added June 12, 2008:
typos:
Line 1 to read as: Broiler chickens are engineered....
The last line ( in clarification) to read as
Today's poultry engineers the birds to have stronger legs, fleshy bodies, smaller intestines, controlled reproduction etc., with the idea of making optimizing prime-meat in chicken. Are we far away from engineering chickens without a head and tail because nobody eats them?
Clarification added July 7, 2008:
Eli Roberson said that there is no reason to believe that the infertility of an animal or plant that one eats would affect the fertility of the person eating it. I responded by saying:
It is perhaps not scientifically established that the infertility of an animal or fruit would affect the fertility. But if you analyze it logically, perhaps in reverse, you would begin to question how an aphrodisiac work. Certain food substances are believed to have aphrodisiac properties, even certain forms of meat, lamb for instance, or parts of lamb, are believed to contribute to enhance the virility of a person. How does it happen? It happens because the food that one consumes takes effect on a person's biology. So how could the reverse be untrue ?
Clarification added July 7, 2008:
In his response Prabhat Sinha has said "Chickens .... are kept in cages with about nine square inches ... of space per bird". With reference to that Kevin Mullent wrote:
Kevin Mullen (Linkedin Answers)
to me
show details 10:31 PM (14 hours ago)
Reply
Kevin Mullen wrote:
"9 square inches? What kind of chickens do you eat?"
Dear Kevin Mullen,
It is typical of at least 70% of all poultry produced to have such conditions. Please see the following images:
http://www.all-creatures.org/anex/chicken-egg-01.jpg
http://www.all-creatures.org/anex/chicken-egg-02.jpg
http://greenfield.fortunecity.com/garden/156/broilers.html
There are a few large poultry farms in countries with stringent regulations where the cage size is more scientific and the space per bird would be larger. These are not what could be taken as representative of the Industry's practices. A PR executive from a poultry industry might show case the showpiece cages with ergonomic water feed etc... but that wouldn't be typical.
Answers (22)
My initial response would be that I have no reason to believe that the infertility of an animal, fruit, or vegetable would effect the fertility of a person eating it. The only exception to this I would think would be if the items are infertile due to fertility destroying chemical treatment that would affect humans (which the FDA wouldn't allow if there was any evidence in support of it) or if the food items contained hormones close enough to the human hormone structure that was stable enough to survive stomach acid and intestinal denaturation, cross into the blood stream, and remain stable. Either way, if there was evidence to support this hypothesis then these items wouldn't be allowed to come to market.
Clarification added July 7, 2008:
The logic of your clarification seems circular, like saying all butterflies are moths so all moths are butterflies (not true). Either way, the example of aphrodisiacs of ANY kind is related to sexual desire, not fertility. An increase in sexual desire isn't an increase in fertility. Even if a person was purposefully, directly exposed to a drug or biological molecule that decreased sexual desire that isn't the same as decreasing fertility.
Who says you have to eat that stuff? Just eat organic food and stop worrying. A few flower pots on a porch, and you'll have all the natural peas, tomatoes, and raspberries you could possibly want. Plant a few walnut and apple trees in the backyard (if you have one), and you'll have to start giving food away, there will be so much.
Arnab S
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Hi,
I completely agree with Richard's POV.
That's applicable even if you are a fish eater.
Try a small tank :)
Going back to your worries, Eli's argument is right.
We should actually be more bothered by the huge quantities of "poison" or chemicals entering our systems.
We can be fertile & reproduce only when we live long enough I'd guess.
As an afterthought, as long as the organs function properly, we may not require to add to the global population. Resources are already on such a premium!
Clarification added July 7, 2008:
Addendum: I know many who enjoy chewing (cooked) chicken heads.
Yhe only way that these types of food products would make us infertile or impotent is if they are deficient in the nutrients that help us maintain our fertility and libido or if they were substantially abundant in nutrients (including hormones, etc) that actually reduce fertility and libido.
Furthermore, one would need to consume these products quite regularly and in fairly large amounts for many, many years to result in substantial genetic mutations that would have ongoing affects on both the individual and the individual's offspring.
Clarification added July 7, 2008:
Also, every part of every animal produced as a food source is used in some way, shape or form (whether it be in the production of food products for other animals (such as dog food) or in the production of industrial products (such as certain resins) or even for food products such as gelotine (jelly)for human consumption).
PRABHAT S
Initiated unique and breakthrough methods to connect business with business and people. Across India and worldwide.
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Hi Siva,
I don't quite know about the infertility issue, but I can send you part of authentic document
National Geography Survey Quote:
"To provide enough beef, chicken, and pork to meet the demand, the livestock industry has moved to factory farming. Producing eight ounces of beef requires 6,600 gallons (25,000 liters) of water; 95 percent of world soybean crops are consumed by farm animals, and 16 percent of the world's methane, a destructive greenhouse gas, is produced by belching, flatulent livestock. The enormous quantities of manure produced at factory farms becomes toxic waste rather than fertilizer, and runoff threatens nearby streams, bays, and estuaries.
Chickens at a typical farm are kept in cages with about nine square inches (about 60 square centimeters) of space per bird. To force them to lay more eggs, they are often starved. Chickens slaughtered for meat are first fattened up with hormones, sometimes to the point where their legs can no longer support their weight.
Crowded conditions can lead to the rapid spread of disease among the animals. To prevent this, antibiotics are included in their feed. The World Health Organization reports that the widespread use of these drugs in the livestock industry is helping breed antibiotic-resistant microbes, complicating the treatment of disease in both animals and people."
Cheers
Prabhat
Soledad Q
at Universidad Santo Tomás
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IT IS IMPOSSIBLE!!! I have a Ph.D. in biochemistry and I can ASSURE you there is NO CHANCE for this to happen.
The first answer is very good. Plus, if they were to inject something to make the chicken infertile, they would have to inject 100 times more to make it effective in human. If you add that you eat the meat cook, the cooking process gets rid of most of what may have been inyected.
If the infertility is made by genetics, there is NO MEANS to affect the human body.
This is the kind of comments that only scares people with no scientific base. I know the details and I am not scared. Knowledge is power, so please, read more (and not just press articles), ask to the people who knows.
Do not grow this questions into fear with no real facts behind it.
Soledad Quiroz
PS: My profile says "graduate student" because now I am getting another degree.
Eggs are the best source for proteins for human! And almost complete!
Kevin M
Biomedical Specialist at Pfizer
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9 square inches? What kind of chickens do you eat?
Soledad and Eli are correct. I hope scientific claims and opinions on this forum can remain evidence-based. Pseudoscience and health-care nonsense might best be posted elsewhere...Please?
Eric O
Medical Student at Georgetown University School of Medicine
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I just want to second Alan. Soledad and Eli are correct, and in response to the OP, it doesn't even make "logical sense" even "in reverse" - whatever that means. This topic belongs in some sort of "healthcare rumors and hearsay" category, not biotech. Incidentally, and more importantly, why isn't there a larger number of categories dedicated to healthcare, biotech, and pharma?
Gerald L
Gerry Lo 羅振業 Project Engineering 4470 contacts
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Vanakkam, Mr Muthusamy
Well, there is the old Western expression "You are what you eat," which might possibly explain my fondness for goose as well as jerk chicken...
Some scientists believe that the domestic chicken originated in Southeast Asia, and that the noble progenitor of our modern poultry might be at risk of genetic dilution through miscegenation.
In this regard, perhaps the infertility may be a desirable feature of the genetically modified organism, but I am no scientist.
As regards infertility in human consumers, I suspect there are other environmental factors contributing in greater proportion to our modern pathologies.
Again, I am not a scientist, but observe that there are today more of us living longer than ever before.
I have been consuming chicken since I was little, and have yet to acquire any of the aspects of that noble creature (including its procreative habits).
We of Southern Chinese extraction are inordinately fond of roast capon, which consumption has not seemed to yet have deleteriously affected the health or apparent viability of my three children.
It is my very rudimentary understanding that the human digestion process is capable of assimilating prodigious quantities of nutrients, but also at a macromolecular level rather considerably coarser than at the scale of embedded genetic materials.
I believe one may find online many posts to the effect that genetically modified organisms have not yet received statistically sufficient safety testing to qualify as reliable sources of nutrition, and a few to the effect that a vast industrial conspiracy is afoot.
Poyit vareen, Sir.
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James W
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I don't know, but this is just another uncertainty that re enforces my decision to a vegetarian.
Anything which is taken in right quantities is GOOD. Chicken/Egg if taken too much/too frequently may cause problems.
Chicken should be absolutely contraindicated in Pregnant women/women who plan to have a baby. The scientific concept behind that is chicken adds too much of heat to the body. Egg white (without YOLK) is supposed to be the best protein source & hence no problems.
Chicken is the best meat option for patients with cardiac disorders. However, it is always recommended to be a "Vegetarian" (dont understand this as vegan) to lead a longer healthier life. Occasional intake of meat (for people who are so used to "meat") is fine.
Alternatively Duck's egg is supposed to be good for health, as it cools down the body! Good luck for your hunt...
Vaikunth
Mohammed Hussain K
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I don't think so, Siva. Its just the way you take it. Consuming on a high rate can be bad. And if you intake anything in excess, it not good at all.
Vinay K
"EPC' Proj Manager [Chem, Power, O&G] / Process Engr
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I do not think it will make any difference. But you never know like the use of organic food & cloth may make us back ….. monkeys.
Does eating fertile chicken make one fertile ?
Cristina P
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I have not heard specifically about the chicken and the egg in relation to infertility. However, there is a lot of information about environmental pollution and testicular cancer, which leads to infertility. .
It has been shown that several chemicals present in environmental pollution have the capacity to act as carcinogens and as hormones. When these chemicals are taken into the body through air pollution, they can mimic the effects of the body's natural hormones and disrupt a number of important biological processes. Environmental pollutants that can mimic the hormone estrogen include DDT, DDE, kepone, heptachlor, PCBs, dioxin, and break-down products of detergents.
These compounds can be carried for long distances through air pollution and then deposited into soil and water, and eventually into the food chain. These hormonally active chemicals have been shown to disrupt the reproductive development of fish and wildlife, often resulting in infertility due to feminization of males or masculinization of females. Offspring may be permanently affected by exposure to these chemicals while they are still in the mother's uterus.
For example, it is known that exposure to the synthetic estrogen Diethylstilbestrol (DES) produces severe reproductive effects in offersprings of DES-taking mothers. Prenatal exposure to DES is associated with vaginal cancer, peri-ovarian cysts, abnormalities of the uterus, and reproductive dysfunction in the female offspring. It is reported that males develop testicular abnormalities and undescended testes. In addition, exposure to DDT and PCBs may be associated with breast cancer.
According to Kathy Bryant, LLB, American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology - dioxin, a very toxic environmental chemical, is capable of blocking estrogen action, lowering levels of androgens (male hormones), and affecting the amount of thyroid hormones produced. It can also affect how much insulin and glucocorticoid is secreted and has been implicated as a cause for endometriosis.
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Sarah F
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Infertile birds feels like a great thing to sell to countries with large populations of poor people...
Eating chicken day after day might do more than make you infertile. From an evolutionary perspective, eating static diets may be causing increases in several diseases. Most notably, geneticists have determined that there are increasing amounts of food allergies in western children exposed to a processed diet. Some believe that increasing autism rates are also a manifestation of this phenomenon. Mankind is slowly loosing it's abilities to eat raw wild foods. There is some corollary evidence of this and geneticists and evolutionary biologists are scrambling to determine if standardized diets are the cause.
Now to your question:
In terms of eating genetically altered food, other than what I have laid out above there shouldn't be a problem. Protein is protein, genetically altered protein is STILL protein and digests in your tummy the exact same way. There is no DNA juice left over that magically passes through your digestive tract to threaten your ability to make people. There are plenty of things to worry about, but this isn't one of them.
If they were able to grow cloned chicken mcnuggets in a petri dish they would probably be just as delicious and they may even be able to get them to express Omega 3 fatty acids so that they are beneficial to your heart.
By the way, about aphrodisiac effects. I defy you to find a real clinical study that proves one for any food item. It doesn't work...despite the folklore. If anyone needs help with that, think little blue pills. They actually do work.
While I do agree that the likelihood of the occurrence of infertility through the consumption of GMOs is extremely low, there have been studies done that indicate decline in fertility due to the consumption of GMOs (corn) in later generations. While there is an obvious geno- and phenotypic difference between the two (chicken and corn), I think it is important that we keep our minds open for evidence pointing to the contrary.
And, as many people in this discussion stated - too much of something is never a good thing! Look at the rise in antimicrobial resistance or heart disease!
http://www.greenpeace.org/seasia/en/press/releases/gmos-potential-threat-to-ferti
I am not shocked or surpised to see or hear such news any more. I am POSITIVE our food quality is one of those environmental disaster that is going to contribute to most of us, if not all, die of some nasty cancer or condition. I just finished seeing the documentary movie Flow and in that movie, they suggested the crazy amount of compounds such as Atrozine ( a pesticide) that is widely used in USA and is banned in EU is known to have feminizing effects on MALE organisms, including human male, causing infertility, becoming impotent, etc....there u go!
Clarification added 8 months ago:
and for all those organic food lovers, I have news, there is NO way someone can claim this farm is fully organic and the next farm is not. Pollens travel miles and go from farm to farm, a GMO pollen has effects of gettimg mixed up in an organic farm and in fact, it has a much better cgances of survival against many environmental barriers. There are also gene exchange that can happenbetweeen similar plants and this is just a very natural phenomenon, I can ONLY comprehend plants to be organic if and only if MILES in all direction from that farm is ALL organic which is just a joke in USA these days. Many farms have divided up their lands into organic and inorganic sections....imagine how ridiculous that is!
I truly believe the hormones that go into chicken and eggs, or in beef have a direct impact on the development of our children.
I am 100% organic as were the food I fed my children!
