SUNDAY - JULY 19, 1998

President Bill Clinton signed a bill into law on October 11th, 1996,
called the ECONOMIC ESPIONAGE ACT (Public Law 104-294), which was
enacted in order to protect economic trade secrets.  This piece of
legislation insured that any individual revealing a trade secret could
be prosecuted and go to jail for 15 years and receive a $1 million
dollar fine.  Organizations revealing trade secrets are subject to fines
of no more than $5 million dollars.  (The Dairy Education Board does not
have that kind of money in the bank . . .yet!)

This bill worries me because I have a trade secret that I would like to
reveal.  The secret belongs to MONSANTO, manufacturer of the genetically
engineered bovine growth hormone.  In 1992 the Honorable Inspector
General of the United States Richard Kusserow wrote that if and when
MONSANTO'S genetically engineered bovine growth hormone was approved,
pertinent research data would be released.  I have filed Freedom of
Information Act requests for the data from those studies and seeked
release of key data in Federal Court.  I've lost on all accounts.

What do the data show?  Laboratory animals treated with the new hormone
in our milk and cheese and butter actually got cancer.  I can tell you
that much because FDA leaked that info in the August 24, 1990 issue of
the journal Science.

When I met with FDA scientists on April 21, 1995, these scientists
admitted to me that the key bit of research revealing problems with
MONSANTO'S bioengineered FRANKINFOOD was never rigorously reviewed. 
MONSANTO was clever enough to have had their top dairy scientists,
Margaret Miller and Suzanne Sechen, hired by FDA to review their own
research.  When MONSANTO was aware that laboratory animals got cancer
from this new hormone they somehow got their attorney Michael Taylor
hired by FDA to write the labeling laws governing the use of this new
hormone.  Congress had passed a law in 1958 prohibiting any food
additive that caused cancer in lab animals to be approved for our
consumption. That law was called the Delaney Amendment (to the Pure Food
and Drug Act).  Before coming to FDA Taylor wrote a paper that was
published in the Journal of American Toxicology (November 4, 1988)
called "A Deminimus Interpretation of the Delaney Amendment."  This
paper minimized the way FDA viewed cancer.  "Everything causes cancer,"
they reasoned.  Cancer in lab animals from this new hormone was ignored.

When Congress considered passing a law to label milk and dairy products
containing this hormone a committee debated the bill (Dairy, Livestock
and Poultry) and the bill expired before it ever reached a vote by the
House of Representatives.  I investigated the twelve members of this
committee and discovered that four of the members took bribes (they call
it PAC money) directly from MONSANTO.  Imagine . . . they voted on a
bill concerning MONSANTO while accepting money from the firm!

The incriminating trade secrets are contained in an unpublished study
authored by Richard, Odaglia and Deslex performed for Searle
Pharmaceuticals in 1989.  Searle was working closely with MONSANTO and
shortly after this study was performed Searle was purchased by MONSANTO.

Is a trade secret and economic espionage as important as preventing
cancer in our children?  The average spleen increase of animals treated
with MONSANTO'S genetically engineered poison was 46%.  FDA concluded
that there were no biological effects. 

I tell this story in great detail in "MILK-The Deadly Poison."  I tiptoe
on the fine line between what is legal and what is not, knowing that I
place my future and the future of my family in jeopardy by revealing
such secrets. 

Do I actually have the trade secrets which, if released, would send me
to jail?

The weight of one male rat's heart was 3 1/2 grams which FDA scientists
dismissed as "an impossible value."  While 360 laboratory animals were
studied, FDA claims that there were too many questionable weights for
sexual organs of these animals to provide "a reliable analyses of these
organs."  What I have just written has never been officially released to
the public.  (Will I get a knock on my door in the middle of the night?)

Eat cheese or butter or ice cream and drink milk containing this hormone
and place the health of yourself and your children at great risk.  Why
do you think that FDA and our government continues to protect MONSANTO? 
Do you think that MONSANTO'S $500 million dollar investment might be
imperiled if this little trade secret were to be revealed?

I say... RELEASE the study!  Call upon your congressman or
congresswoman to get this study released.  If I am wrong I will admit
so.  If I am right, we are all in jeopardy.  Guess what?  I've seen the
study.  I am not wrong.  We have a problem so serious and we continue to
offer the protective veil of trade protection for MONSANTO to hide
behind.  We have passed a law to protect MONSANTO.  Is money and profit
so important so as to sacrifice the health and safety of our children?

Robert Cohen
Executive Director
Dairy Education Board
http://www.notmilk.com