Police had prepared for weeks in advance of the protest and the biotechnology conference, where 8,000 scientists, researchers and CEOs are scheduled to gather over five days. The meeting is the country's largest-ever biotechnology gathering, officials said. Genetically engineered foods and medicines have not been proven to be safe and should be removed from supermarket shelves, said protesters, who Sunday challenged biotech industry leaders to a debate. Industry officials disagree. They say genetically engineered foods, from tomatoes to soybeans, have been studied and given a thumbs-up by federal regulators.
Biotech foods are the only foods that have been studied to any extent for safety.
Protesters ignore the industry's successes, according to Carl B. Feldbaum, president of the Biotechnology Industry Organization, sponsor of the conference. In 1999 alone, Feldbaum said, the FDA approved 22 new biotech drugs to battle ovarian cancer, influenza, arthritis and other ailments. The attention given protesters has had an upside for the industry, according to Feldbaum. Seven thousand would have been a record and it looks like we're going to break 8,000. Conference attendees took the protests in stride.