WHY BAN BOVINE GROWTH HORMONE? Science, Social Welfare, and the Divergent Biotech Policy Landscapes in Europe and the United States

摘要

In the late 1980s, proposals circulated in European Union policy-making institutions that called for adding a new criterion―dubbed the 'fourth hurdle'―to the standard three dimensions across which new veterinary technologies were evaluated for marketing authorization in the EU. To the traditional three criteria of safety, efficacy and quality, some policymakers and activists wanted to add an evaluation of socio-economic effects. That is, proponents of the fourth hurdle wanted the decision to permit commercialization to be based not just on whether the technology was safe, effective, and of good quality, but also on what kind of impact a new technology might have on the social structure of European agriculture if commercialized.