Lowey And Kennedy Introduce Food Allergen Consumer Protection Act

I just received the following message from Congresswoman Lowey's Legislative Aide:
"I will have the House and Senate bills numbers sometime next week. The
bill
was just introduced yesterday, and it takes a day or two before we get a
#.
Thanks for offering to help move the bill. The best thing to do is
encourage friends to write their representatives and senators asking for
their support of the bill."
I'll continue to keep everyone posted!

The Food Allergen Consumer Protection can now be found on
Thomas: [url="http://thomas.loc.gov/"]http://thomas.loc.gov/[/url]
The bill # is HR 4704 on the House side and S2499 on the Senate side.
Here is a sample letter as suggested by our friends at the Center for Science in the Public Interest. I STRONGLY encourage you to personalize the sample letter by incorporating your own experiences as a food-allergic consumer or the parent of a food-allergic child. An individualized letter is worth ten mass-produced letters. Also, as CSPI points out, while an e-mail to your Senators or House Representative is good, an "ordinary mail" letter is better. The bill needs bipartisan support to pass, so I urge you to write your own ordinary mail letter as soon as you can:
Dear Senator/Representative _____:
I urge you to cosponsor S. 2499/HR 4704, the Food Allergen Consumer Protection Act. Millions of Americans have food allergies, and each year about 150 people in the United States die from anaphylactic shock caused by a food allergy.
Most children who have food allergies have their first exposure to allergens in their homes. A 2000 survey conducted jointly by the Food and Drug Administration, Minnesota, and Wisconsin found that one-quarter of the bakery products, candy, and ice cream sampled were contaminated with peanut or egg ingredients that were not declared on the product labels.
S. 2499/HR 4704 (introduced by Senator Kennedy/Representative Lowey on May 7, 2002) would require companies to list the major allergens (including those in spices, flavorings, and colorings) by their common English names in a more readable format and to include a telephone number on the label that consumers could call for more information. The legislation would also require manufacturers to better prevent cross-contact between products made in the same facility or on the same production line and would permit them to indicate on labels that the food may contain allergens when the possibility of contamination cannot be totally excluded. The bill would also allow the Food and Drug Administration to assess penalties against firms that violate the food allergen requirements and require the Centers for Disease Control to establish a system for tracking food allergy-related deaths. Finally, the bill directs the Secretary of Health and Human Services to develop recommendations on training emergency medical technicians with respect to administering epinephrine and the need for emergency vehicles to carry such devices, to support activities to increase awareness of guidelines aimed at training restaurant employees on preparing allergen-free foods, and to develop recommendations for schools on how to prepare allergen-free foods.
I urge you to cosponsor this important public health legislation.
Sincerely,
Name
Address
[This message has been edited by Colleen's Mom (edited May 15, 2002).]
[This message has been edited by Colleen's Mom (edited May 17, 2002).]

Colleen's Mom,
Thanks for the info.
I'll be sending my letters out right away. I will also email this info to all my family and friends.
B's Mom