Genetically Manipulated Bull Put to Sleep

[Kadie]

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20040402_637.html

Herman the Bull, First Farm Animal Carrying Human Gene, Is Euthanized Due to Arthritis

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands April 2 — Herman the Bull, the world's first farm animal carrying a human gene, was euthanized Friday because he was suffering from a form of arthritis, his caretakers said.

He was 13, not exceptionally old for a bull. His ailment was unrelated to his genetic manipulation, said the Naturalis museum in Leiden where Herman spent his final years.

A human gene was spliced into Herman's genetic code while in an early embryonic stage in 1990, in the hope that milk produced by his female offspring would bear a human milk protein. The process was cutting-edge at the time, but has since been refined and is commonly used

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This story just doesn't seem right to me, I am all for technology, but for some reason this story gives me the creeps. It also states that Herman spent the last couple of years with two cloned cows, and that they are saving his skin so they can stuff him and put him on display someday.

[fob]

1. Good thing he wasn't here in the US, he'd be eligible to be

made into hamburgers.