From: massiecoolwell@hotmail.com
Sent: Monday, February 12, 2001 6:17 PM
To: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov
Cc: massiecoolwell@hotmail.com
Subject: Oppose FDA's New Regulations on Genetically Engineered Food

Lynn Johnson
Chestnut
Asheville, NC  28801 
massiecoolwell@hotmail.com


RE: Docket No. 00N-1396, and 00D-1598

Dear FDA,

The job of the Food and Drug Administration, as I understand it, is to protect the American public from food and drugs that could detrimentally affect our health.
 
I am greatly concerned about your new policies on genetically engineered (GE) foods. You should be (and certainly are)aware that these foods could be toxic, could cause allergic responses, could have lower nutrition value, could compromise immune responses in consumers, and could cause irreparable damage to the environment. Until we have conclusive evidence of their safety, a moratorium should be in place.  Until then, at a minimum, these GE "foods" should be clearly labelled with great penalty to the non-complier of these new regulations.

Despite overwhelming consumer demand, your agency still fails to require safety testing and mandatory labeling for GE foods. Your "notification" policy is an insult to consumers, and irresponsibly ignores strong scientific evidence of numerous potential health and environmental risks to GE foods. 

I am also greatly opposed to your new "voluntary labeling" policy, which denies consumers a basic right to know. 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 will also be deprived of the critical knowledge they need to hold food producers liable should any of these novel foods prove hazardous.

Your proposed rules ignore serious concerns, and appear to be a decision made to convenience industry at the expense of public health and the environment. I will not accept your attempt to make me a guinea pig of these untested foods, and I trust you will take my concern along with the thousands of others into serious consideration.

A reminder:  your job IS to protect the consumer, that's YOU AND ME, our husbands, our wives, our parents, our children, our siblings and the generations that will follow us saying "What were they thinking about?"  Your job IS NOT to protect the big-monied corporations.

Sincerely,



Lynn Johnson