From: Kaliana,LLC [kaliana@kaliana.com]
Sent: Saturday, March 24, 2001 9:39 AM
To: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov
Subject: labeling and testing GE foods

Importance: High

As a citizen and a consumer whom you are suppose to protect, I request that my rights as a consumer, parent and the rights of my children to a safe and healthy future be protected. We do not know the long term affects or ramifications of how GE will affect ourselves, our children or our children's children. How many times have we allowed a drug to go to market only to find out years later the altering affects on the children of the women who took the drug when they were pregnant. Let us learn from our past mistakes before we create a problem that is too big to turnaround. The years it will take to prove that GE is safe are nothing compared to the horror if we allow them to go forward only to discover later, when humanity has been used as the guinea pig, that we have altered ourselves beyond repair. YOU are allowing us and your children to be drugged without our consent and without our ability to avoid such  contamination if we so choose. YOU HAVE TAKEN AWAY OUR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS! YOU HAVE IGNORED THE VERY PURPOSE FOR WHICH YOUR DEPARTMENT WAS CREATED!

    a.. The FDA must require mandatory pre-market safety testing and environmental review of  Gene Altering Chemicals, Genetic Engeneering and Genetically Engenieered Products. This should include comprehensive environmental review of these chemicals. Unlike conventional pollutants, where a given amount of pollutant causes a limited amount of damage, a small number of mutant genes could have a  population explosion and reproduce forever, causing unlimited and irreparable damage.
    a.. The FDA must require mandatory pre-market long-term health testing. GE products could be toxic, cause allergic responses, have lower nutritional value, and compromise immune responses in consumers.
    a.. The FDA must require mandatory labeling of GE foods and release the restrictions on voluntary labeling of non-GE foods. The restrictions on voluntary labeling is a violation of our constitutional rights as consumers. 
    a.. The FDA must ensure public access to adequate information for independent review.
    
    b.. The FDA must end its cozy relationship with the industries it purports to be regulating. People have been allowed to work for a biotech company, then work for the FDA writing the regulatory rules on that company's product, then go back to working for the company.  Ninety-two percent of FDA advisory  committee meetings had at least one conflict of interest.
I hope and trust that we can depend on you to honor and uphold the purpose for which you were created.

Sincerely,

Kaliana Schmidt