From: g10121@care2.com
Sent: Tuesday, February 06, 2001 5:49 PM
To: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov
Subject: Oppose FDA's New Regulations on Genetically Engineered Food

Betty Van Wicklen
41 Lake Shore Dr.  2B
Watervliet,, NY  12189 
g10121@care2.com


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

Dear FDA,
 
I am outraged by your new policies on genetically engineered (GE) foods. Your responsibility is to make SURE our foods and drugs are SAFE for public consumption, yet 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. You should be 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. 

I am also greatly opposed to your new "voluntary labeling" policy, which denies consumers a basic right to know. Voluntary labeling is like asking Exxon if it wants to pay for the outstanding damages it owes for the Exxon Valdez oil spill!  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 corporate bottom lines 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 and do the job for which your office was created.

Sincerely,

Betty J. Van Wicklen

Betty Van Wicklen