Where Does Your Meat Come From?

Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports, said that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) blatantly ignored consumers' right to choose what they eat after the FDA announced that it will not require labeling on meat or fish from genetically engineered animals.

The Bush administration announced Final Guidance on Regulation of Genetically Engineered Animals. The FDA Guidance states that FDA will require such animals to go through a mandatory safety approval process, a decision Consumers Union supports. However FDA will not require any labeling.

A recent Consumers Union poll found that 95 percent of consumers favor labeling of meat and milk from genetically engineered animals.

Genetically engineered animals may contain genetic material from entirely different species, even humans. For example, last week an FDA advisory committee reviewed the safety of a goat engineered with human genes so that it would produce a human blood thinner in the goat's milk.

To read the text in its entirety, please visit the Conusmer's Union website, www.consumersunion.org/pub/core_food_safety/006531.html.