A meeting of the Science and Technology Committee (MLHW, Health Sciences Council) was held on 18 February 2010 at which a serious incident report submitted by the Ariake Hospital of the Japanese Foundation for Cancer Research was announced. This hospital is carrying out gene therapy in an attempt to raise the resistance towards the administering of large amounts of anticancer drugs through the use of MDRI (multidrug-resistance gene) on patients with progressive breast cancer. A retrovirus is being used as a vector. It is reported that on 12 June 2009 one patient who was undergoing gene therapy died when the cancer spread to the brain. Although the report states that the patient�fs death was due to the progression of the cancer and that there was �gno causal association with the gene therapy,�h this incident once more gives support to the notion that the dark side of gene therapy is that it is being carried out on terminal cancer patients in order to confirm the safety or otherwise of vectors. (Also see BJ August 2009)

Table 1: GM crops approved for open field cultivation (Type 1 usage) (Biodiversity Impact Assessment Investigative Commission)
Crop	Trait	Application (Developer)	Name	Approval Date*
Cotton	Glyphosate and gluphosinate herbicide tolerance	Bayer CropScience	GHB614 × LLCotton25, OECD UI: BCS-GH002-5 × ACS-GH001-3	25 February 2010
Soy	Dicamba herbicide resistance	Monsanto Japan	MON87708, OECD UI: MON-87708-9	25 February 2010
Maize	Resistance to glyphosate-induced male sterility and glyphosate resistance	Monsanto Japan	MON87427, OECD UI: MON-87427-7	25 February 2010
* Technically, approval is granted after public comments have been accepted.