Biotech and performance enhancement will continue blurring more and more lines–and not just for horses. From Will Oremus at Slate:
‘Reversing an earlier ban, the international governing body for equestrian sports has decided that cloned horses can compete alongside their traditionally bred counterparts.
‘The FEI will not forbid participation of clones or their progenies in FEI competitions,’ the Federation Equestre Internationale said after its June meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, according to The Chronicle of the Horse. ‘The FEI will continue to monitor further research, especially with regard to equine welfare.’
That’s good news for two companies—ViaGen in Texas and Cryozootech in France—that have successfully cloned champion horses, mainly for breeding purposes. Cryozootech has produced two clones of the American show-jumping champion Gem Twist. ViaGen, which owns the rights to the technology that produced the famous cloned sheep Dolly, has cloned several horses, including a quarter horse, a barrel racer, and a polo pony.”
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Mark Walton, President of ViaGen, the “cloning company”:
Tags: Will Oremus