From: Vivian Van Horn [vmvanhorn@hotmail.com] Sent: Friday, March 30, 2001 2:06 PM To: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov Subject: Docket 00N-1396 and Docket 00D-1598 "Docket 00N-1396 & Docket 00D-1598" >FW: more on GE foods TELL THE FDA THAT GENETICALLY ENGINEERED PRODUCTS MUST BE LABELED AND TESTED FOR SAFETY! The Food and Drug Administration is now accepting public comment on its proposed new rules on genetically engineered (GE) foods. The FDA has failed to require health and ecological safety testing or mandatory labeling, and thus puts the public's health and our environment at risk and deprives us of the right to know or choose what we are eating. Please consider the following: * The FDA must require mandatory pre-market comprehensive environmental review. Unlike conventional pollutants, where a given amount of pollutant causes a limited amount of damage, a small number of mutant genes could have a population explosion and reproduce forever, causing unlimited and irreparable damage. * The FDA must require mandatory pre-market long-term health testing. GE products could be toxic, cause allergic responses, have lower nutritional value, and compromise immune responses in consumers. * The FDA must require mandatory labeling of GE products. Without mandatory labeling, neither consumers nor health professionals will know if an allergic or toxic reaction was the result of a genetically engineered food. Consumers would be deprived of the critical knowledge needed to hold food producers liable should any of these novel products be hazardous. * The FDA must end its cozy relationship with the industries it purports to be regulating. People have been allowed to work for a biotech company, then work for the FDA writing the regulatory rules on that company's product, then go back to working for the company. Ninety-two percent of FDA advisory committee meetings had at least one conflict of interest. Vivian M. Van Horn 1870 Veteran Avenue #215 Los Angeles, CA 90025 _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com