What the HEK

A friend recently shared this article from the ever-charming Examiner, with injunctions to boycott Pepsico (BUT WHERE WOULD I GET MY FRITOS), because Pepsico was flavoring our drinks with dead babies.

Really?

I couldn't quite believe that. So I did a swift google search ("fetal cells enhance flavor"):

The-prolifers seems abuzz. And here is LifeSiteNews with its breaking news article!

Well, breaking news in the 70s, maybe. See, basically what's at issue here is using a cell *line* from HEK 293. In other words it's a maintained cell line that originated from some embryonic tissue cells, the same one that's been used in drug testing and virus research for years. 

Now, I'm not saying the pro-lifers can't take issue with HEK 293 and be consistent with their principles--they do, after all, decry abortion, and these cells originated from an aborted fetus. But do pro-lifers decry organ donation with this much vim and vigor? I think that disagreeing with abortion and disagreeing with the use of fetal cells (in a freaking cell line like HEK293) are two very separate arguments. I doubt many pro-lifers would agree, but I thought I would throw that one out there anyway. 

The shit that really bugs me is the inaccuracy of this flaming, Satan-is-coming-now, The-World-is-Evil reporting. You won't get the courtesy of even a cursory summary of what HEK293 is from the pro-lifers, of course. Let's take a look at the Examiner article I linked to above: 

...fetal cells are being used as receptors to test new and different flavors by Senomyx, a company that contracts with Pepsi.

It’s bad enough that babies are being aborted at all, but to then use them to create a more delicious Pepsi is just nauseating...

"Fetal cells" is pithier, I imagine, than "cell line originally derived from aborted embryonic tissue, a cell line which is biotech standard and has been used to construct a number of vaccines and conduct virus research." 

And the muck of the internet is even better, overflowing with pious Catholics conjuring images of baby-debris floating with the ice in your Diet Coke, thezombieapocalypsebegins.

Anyway, I'm waiting for more credible sources than LifeSiteNews to take a shot at this one, but as far as I can tell HEK 293 is what Senomyx is using, if anything.