Corparate espionage

After Sheep Dolly and Bull Herman Chinese scientists managed to clone a complete herd of cow (well, herd, 17 of them, the rest of the 45 cloned calves didn’t survive the experiment) that are said to produce human milk. What they did, in fact, was putting loads of money, time and energy into altering the DNA of cows so that in their milk those cows will produce 3 (three!) natural human resembling protective proteins. Yang et al underline in their article that the modified milk resembles normal cow’s milk as in lactose, protein contents and the like. The excellent work by professor Hanson (2007) has shown clarly that the way breastfeeding protects babies has a lot more in it than 3 isolated proteins in cow’s milk. It encompasses both the process of breastfeeding and the product human milk and is a duet by mother and child. The maternal breast is much more than just a milk-making organ, it is an important,  proactive and interactive functioning, provider of specific and a-specific protective substances, amongst which living blood cells. An important trigger for the production of  specific antibodies is the actual drinking at the breast by the baby, who, while doing so, colonizes his mother with potential pathogens. (As do a cow’s udders for her calve, and the dog-mom’s nipples for her pups.) It is an exhibition of utter arrogance and unscrupulous money-greediness that any scientist may pretend to be able to reproduce this.
Yang B, Wang J, Tang B, Liu Y, Guo C, et al. 2011 Characterization of Bioactive Recombinant Human Lysozyme Expressed in Milk of Cloned Transgenic Cattle. PLoS ONE 6(3): e17593.
Hanson, L. (2007). The role of breastfeeding in the defense of the infant. In T. Hale, & P. Hartmann, Textbook of Human Lactation (pp. 159-192). Amarillo, TX: Hale Publishing, L.P.