From: flintworks@earthlink.net
Sent: Monday, February 12, 2001 6:26 PM
To: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov
Cc: flintworks@earthlink.net
Subject: Oppose FDA's New Regulations on Genetically Engineered Food

Shelby Flint
21400 Encina Rd
Topanga, CA  90290 
flintworks@earthlink.net


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

Dear FDA,
 
I protest your new policies on genetically engineered (GE) foods. I expect you to respond to consumer demand, and require safety testing and mandatory labeling for GE foods. Your responsibility is to the public and to the environment, both of which you have been appointed guardians.  Your job is NOT to make it easier for producers and marketers to make a "killing" by keeping the public in the dark about the products they are being sold.  

 Consumers have a basic right to know, which "voluntary labeling" denies them. 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.

Sincerely,



Shelby Flint