What it takes to CRISPR and stay out of jail in the EU

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Pieter

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Feb 21, 2017, 10:31:19 AM2/21/17
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Hi everyone,

The next video on EU policy and DIYBio is out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjGLmLvP3bg

I've used two kits from the ODIN shop, the DIY Bacterial CRISPR kit and the engineer any yeast with GFP kit, to make clear what it takes for a person to do CRISPR under the current EU regulation implementation in The Netherlands. But when speaking with the Biotop group in Heidelberg it turned out they are facing many other constraints as well. 

These differences between countries do not really make sense to me. Today I will interview Biotehna in Slovenia on the same subject, to get a better understanding on the differences. And next I am in contact with the European biosafety association to get a better overview. 

A more uniform legislation across Europe has now entered into the top recommendations in the policy paper too.

All the best,

Pieter

Nathan McCorkle

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Feb 21, 2017, 2:31:17 PM2/21/17
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I don't know if Brexit ended up happening or not, but if it did, does
that mean less regulations for U.K. practitioners?
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Mega [Andreas Stuermer]

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Feb 21, 2017, 6:05:41 PM2/21/17
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Not by default, as they will take over lots of EU regulations. Can't just make up thousands of new replacement laws in a year  

Kermit Henson

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Feb 23, 2017, 6:39:22 AM2/23/17
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Having an indepentent institution (NICE) which uses their own bio-level scale, I wouldnt be surprised if the UK fix this issue in less than 1 or 2 years. Europe needs to legislate for all the countries, which will be very hard given the anti-gmo movement in Europe.

Public institutions needs to push this new legislation, but we should be carefull and avoid the use of this techniques only on these enviroment (why kids can do an ecoli gfp in high-shool?). 
In Spain, for example, I need a BSL-2 in order to make any kind of GMO. As long as I know, this doesnt happen to other european countries.

Pieter Waag

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Mar 2, 2017, 11:37:40 AM3/2/17
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That's indeed an exceptional biosafety level. Just for doing GFP e. coli transformations?

Something really interesting happened in our lab this Tuesday though. We had a CRISPR workshop in our lab, and 25 people went through the procedure of the ODIN's CRISPR kit. During the experiment we told everyone that we would actually need a permit for completing the experiment, but if they wanted too they could just go ahead and do it anyway. To my surprise no one wanted to finish the experiment. Apparently when acting as a group, no one wants to break the law. I am not a trained psycho analist, but still I think it is quite interesting to see that in our community lab kind of setting people are pretty law abiding.

Kermit Henson

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Mar 2, 2017, 12:04:12 PM3/2/17
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Right now, I'm not quite sure about what NICE allows to do and what not. But I know, by first hand, that a few microbes are labeled diferent in UK compared to EU. We are talking about S.aureus (which is found naturally on the skin) 

Very intersting the "no one wanted to finish the experiment", didnt expect that turn. Is it a cultural fact? So, could it happen the same situation in UK, Spain or Deutchland?
Dont know how respectfull are dutch people with laws, but I'm quite sure that south european wouldnt have much problem with this or some russian guy (microwave+russia on youtube, for those curious).

Also, in case we introduce some "troll" in the group, would the group follow the troll?

Should we make a diybio european-wide crisper night? 

BraveScience

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Mar 3, 2017, 4:07:26 AM3/3/17
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I agree with your thesis, people in the netherlands are very much following the rules.

And i speak as an italian dude living in Amsterdam. Laws are somewhat more flexible in italy and depend heavily on social perception.
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