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28 March, 2001
Tell The FDA That Genetically Engineered Products Must Be Labeled And Tested For Safety!

The Food and Drug Administration is now accepting public comment on its proposed new rules on genetically engineered (GE) foods. Despite overwhelming consumer demand, the FDA has failed to require health and ecological safety testing or mandatory labeling, and thus puts your health and our environment at risk and deprives you of the right to know or choose what you are eating.The proposed rules:

• Do not require mandatory pre-market safety testing
• Do not require pre-market environmental review
• Do not require mandatory labeling of GE foods
• Restrict voluntary labeling of non-GE foods
• Require a mere letter of notification prior to the marketing of a GE food
• Fail to ensure public access to adequate information for independent review
• Are supported by industry and opposed by consumer groups

The FDA needs to hear from hundreds of thousands of Americans that:

• The FDA must require mandatory pre-market comprehensive environmental review. 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.
• 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.
• The FDA must require mandatory labeling of GE products. 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 would be deprived of the critical knowledge needed to hold food producers liable should any of these novel products be hazardous.
• 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.

PLEASE ACT TODAY. THE DEADLINE FOR COMMENTS IS TUESDAY, APRIL 3.

Email your comments to: fdadockets@oc.fda.gov with "Docket 00N-1396 & Docket 00D-1598" in the Subject line

Mail your comments to:

Docket 00N-1396 & Docket 00D-1598
Dockets Management Branch (HFA-305)
Food and Drug Administration
5630 Fishers Lane, Room 1061
Rockville, MD 20852

For more information: www.organicconsumers.org , 218-226-4164

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