Comment from Chelsie Rencher

I have been made extremely ill by the poison in our food. It has trigger autoimmune illnesses, massive expenses, and hideous suffering. THIS MUST STOP. As an American citizen, I am deeply alarmed and outraged at the state of our broken food system and the failure of regulatory agencies and lawmakers to protect us from its harmful effects. More than 10,000 chemical additives have entered our food supply due to food companies leveraging the decades-old GRAS loophole to self-certify these additives as “safe”. There is growing consensus that many of these chemicals are NOT safe and are contributing to our nation’s chronic disease crisis. Large-scale studies have linked ultra-processed foods to increases in the rates of obesity, chronic diseases, and premature death. Diabetes alone impacts more than 35 million Americans (and has doubled among youth) and costs the U.S more than $400 billion annually. Two years ago, the Director of the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition stated publicly, “Each year, more than a million Americans die from diet-related diseases like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and certain forms of cancer, [and] obesity has increased to historic levels in children and adults.” Our food, in other words, is literally killing us! Meanwhile, many other countries are getting it right. For example, the European Union’s food agency has only approved 411 chemical additives. Again, there are over 10,000 in our food supply. Several Latin American countries have successfully implemented front-of-package warning labels and junk food taxes. The U.S. is the gold standard when it comes to evaluating the safety of our drugs, but why are we so far behind the rest of the world in regulating the safety of our food? The FDA’s food-related mandate is to “protect public health by assuring the safety, efficacy, and security of our nation's food supply.” When it comes to closing the GRAS loophole, the FDA’s position is that it’s up to Congress to fix the problem. Congress, on the other hand, says the problem is a regulatory issue and must be resolved by FDA scientists and administrators. The finger pointing has to stop! My question is simple…will all of you finally work together to CLOSE THE GRAS LOOPHOLE and uphold the FDA’s mandate to protect human health in America?