From: EXECSEC
Sent: Sunday, March 11, 2001 6:03 PM
To: Dockets, FDA
Subject: FW: Docket # 00N-1396 and #00D-1598



> ----------
> From: 	Laura Page[SMTP:BRADY17@HOTMAIL.COM]
> Sent: 	Sunday, March 11, 2001 6:02:27 PM
> To: 	Commissioner
> Subject: 	Docket # 00N-1396 and #00D-1598
> Auto forwarded by a Rule
> 
> 
Commissioner ,

I am extremely concerned that the Food and Drug Administration(FDA) has proposed regulations that still fail to require labels or safety tests on genetically
engineered (GE) food. Labels on GE foods are required in Japan, Russia, and throughout Europe, yet your new
proposal continues to deny Americans the right to know what is in our food.  This is not an extremist request at all.  Consumers all over the world have petitioned their governments for these rights and won.  Isn't this what democracy is about?  I thought that free choice was the backbone of America.

 Labels must be required to protect the public from potential health effects that could only be traced if GE foods can be identified, yet FDA's "voluntary labeling" guidelines will leave thousands of unlabeled GE foods on our supermarket shelves. Furthermore, the agency's proposed rule only requires companies to notify FDA when bringing GE foods to market, but it fails to require any safety testing. Doctors and scientists have warned about the potential for
GE foods to trigger dangerous allergies, change the nutritional value of foods, and cause irreversible harm to
the environment. FDA appears to be playing politics with our food, disregarding science-based precautions that other countries have implemented.

This is not a movement that is isolated by people in organizations like Greenpeace.  It has been documented in well renouned magazines like the Scientific American, Discover, Time and many others.  Isn't it time to take the focus off money and back on the public's health concerns?  
I urge you to reconsider this proposal and insure that GE foods are subject to pre-market testing and labeling. Americans deserve the same protections as the rest of the world. 


Laura Page
4130 Hidden Valley Rd NW
Cleveland, TN 37312
USA
brady17@hotmail.com