From: afun@fullnet.net
Sent: Monday, February 05, 2001 10:16 PM
To: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov
Subject: Docket No. 00N-1396, and 00D-1598



Jane Henney
Dockets Management Branch, Food and Drug Administration
5630 Fisher's Lane, Room 1061
Rockville, MD 20852

Dear Jane Henney,

The new regulations and guidelines put forward by your
agency on genetically engineered (GE) foods are a disappointment
for American consumers. Despite overwhelming and consistent
demand, your agency still fails to require comprehensive
safety testing for GE foods. The notification policy
ignores strong scientific evidence of numerous potential
health and environmental risks to GE foods, and allows
the current system of laissez-faire oversight to continue.
As you know, genetically engineered foods can be toxic,
cause allergic responses, have lower nutrition value,
compromise immune responses in consumers, and cause
irreparable damage to the environment. 

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
foods prove hazardous. And because there are ecological
risks associated with genetically engineered crops,
such as impacts on the soil ecosystem and non-target
species like Monarch butterflies, consumers may want
to avoid them.  We need labeling to be able to make
an educated decision. 

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 trust
you will take my concerns into serious consideration.

When will the time come that people do no have to FIGHT
for every right ofthe  protection we deserve?  Our
food is already losing it's taste and prepackaged foods
have so much salt in them that many ,including myself,
cannot eat them. We are at crisis level now. I am trying
to get as many older time seeds to plant so I can hopefully
get back foods that taste good. Our young people have
no clue as to how food should really taste because
they have grown up eating this rubbage passed off as
food.  WHY DOES NOONE LISTEN TO THE PEOPLE? WE WANT
HEALTHY FOOD THAT HAS A  GOOD FLAVOR AND SMELL. We
WANT LABLES SO THAT WE HAVE A CHOICE NOT TO EAT THESE
 GENETICALLY ALTERED FOODS!!!! 



Sincerely,


Audrey Funston
Rt. 1 Box 503
Nowata, Oklahoma 74048