The comparison to natural foods like garlic shows how little we truly understand about the biological complexity of even the simplest foods. If 99% of garlic’s composition remains a mystery to the USDA, how can we confidently claim that lab-grown meat—which is far more complicated—is safe and equivalent to real meat?
Controlling the narrative
Companies like Upside Foods are shaping public perception with slick marketing while they benefit from a lax regulatory approach from the USDA and FDA. The truth is that lab-grown meat remains largely untested, with insufficient understanding of its long-term effects. The bans in Alabama and Florida should be seen as progressive steps to protect consumers from potentially hazardous foods, rather than as limitations on freedom of choice.
The inconsistency from the FDA is also telling.
Massive road blocks are being erected to prevent you from taking exciting, innovative vitamin formulations that are “new” to the food supply, but when it comes to meat grown from GMO yeast in a lab—it’s all systems go as far as the FDA is concerned.
As these companies continue to push the narrative that their products are indistinguishable from real meat, it’s critical to ask: what meat are they referencing? Is it the factory-farmed, highly processed meat linked to chronic health issues? Or is it the more nutritious, ethically raised meat from regenerative practices?
Without clear answers, lab-grown meat could be another ultra-processed product, designed more for profit than for health…and one that has an eager market in the wake of the widespread climate change narrative that demonizes livestock farming and real meat, not the factory farming systems that produce so much of it.
In the end, the conversation should not focus solely on choice, but on informed choice. Consumers should not be misled. They deserve transparency, rigorous testing, and an honest discussion about the risks and rewards of this emerging technology. Until that happens, we should approach lab-grown meat with caution, questioning whether it’s truly the “guilt-free” alternative it’s made out to be.
Action Alert! Write to Congress and the FDA, telling them that we need more testing of gene-edited foods that research is increasingly finding are not bioequivalent to traditional foods. Please send your message immediately.