‘Hazards to Your Health’

Your editorial makes a good point that we Americans are becoming overprotective in putting warnings on products, edible and otherwise. I agree that part of the reason for the increase is “the sense that there are things that can be done . . . to reduce possible harm.”

However, it seems to me that this is a reflection of our apparent inability to reduce the irrevocable harm that would come from a nuclear war. Americans feel helpless to cope with the enormity of that problem so they concentrate on the smaller ones.

Government has done everything it can to take the nuclear debate away from the general public. New weapons are developed without full scrutiny. Sections of the defense budget are secret even from members of Congress. And Americans get patted on the head and told not to worry about nuclear war or nuclear wastes or the growing nuclear technology. We are told that government has it all in hand. And to prove it President Reagan signs the INF treaty and lulls people into a false sense of security. But in truth, the INF treaty has changed little. Tens of thousands of nuclear weapons still exist and more are being made every day.

So since we feel impotent to change the big problems, all that is left are the little ones.

KATHERINE LITTLEWOOD

Pasadena