Senator Feinstein on Processed Food Safety Act
Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) today introduced legislation to require that food producers take responsibility for keeping food free from harmful pathogens.
The bill would amend the Poultry Products Inspection Act, the Federal Meat Inspection Act and the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act to prohibit the sale of any food that has not been certified to be pathogen free.
“Food producers must be obligated to produce food that is free of pathogens.” Senator Feinstein said. “It is the responsibility of the food producer, not the consumer, to make sure our food safe to eat.”
“Anyone who visits the websites of the USDA or the FDA can see that recalls are not a rare occurrence. In the last month, these two federal agencies recalled thousands of pounds of beef because of E. coli contamination, packages of apples and carrots which contained botulism spores, and dried plums which contained traces of lead.
Serious reform is needed. This bill would require companies that process any kind of food, from ground beef to frozen pot pies, to test their finished products and their ingredients to make sure that they are safe to eat and pathogen free.”
Last month, The New York Times reported two people from New Hampshire and New York died after eating ground beef that may have been tainted with E. coli. Fairbank Farms, a producer in western New York State, has issued a voluntary recall for 545,699 pounds of ground beef products that are suspected to have caused the deaths, according to the newspaper.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimate that foodborne illnesses sicken up to 76 million people, cause 325,000 hospital visits and result in more than 5,000 deaths each year.
Bill Summary
The Processed Food Safety Act requires everyone in the food chain to take responsibility for keeping food free of harmful pathogens. Specifically, the bill:
* Amends the Poultry Products Inspection Act, the Meat Inspection Act and the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to prohibit the sale of any processed poultry, meat and FDA-regulated food that has not either undergone a pathogen reduction treatment, or been certified to contain no verifiable traces of pathogens.
* Requires that labels on ground beef, or any other ground meat product, specifically name every cut of meat that is contained in the product, and;
* Does away with loopholes in current laws that allow for producers to add coloring, synthetic flavorings and spices to their products without informing the consumer.
By enacting these simple changes, the Processed Food Safety Act will drastically reduce the presence of pathogens in our food and improve the ability of the consumer to make informed choices about the products they wish to eat.
SEnator Feinstein is illinformed about what are pathogenic concerns in the food supply. Her purposed changes won't make food safer, just more expensive as companies will have to go to extreme lengths to meet her requirements. What does Senator Feinstein suggest if her purposal is passed and people still suffer food borne illness? That companies are responsible for peoples inability to follow cooking instruction, and maintainig a safe healthful environment in their homes? At what point are people responsible for what they eat?
Consumers need to take our congress critters to task. If they don't comply legally requiring far more information listed on processed foods we're sold, we need to dump them immediately and if possible by recall rather than next election. I want to know why the American people are being poisoned daily by BPA lining our processed canned foods and why there are no BPA free jar lids for canning available? Why isn't BPA banned from use in commercially canned foods and jar lids for home canning? The notion of these cumulative poisoned canned foods flooding US grocers--is light years beyond unacceptable for congress to continue to turn a blind eye to. They can get back to stuffing their freezers with payoffs and breaking us financially AFTER they deal with criminalizing BPA in our commercial and home canned foods. Count me in the number who's furious over the image of silver haired ladies being used by multimillion buck PR firm accounts to palm off on us food in forms we'd never, if aware, choose to buy, eat, or feed our families. I want to know the nation of origin of all contents used in ALL processed foods. As much, I want to know whether milk we think whole fresh milk is actually dried milk from the cheapest source. And do know what food components are domestic and which are imported and from where. Are the eggs used in our processed foods from whole intact shell eggs? Or are we paying top buck or "crack eggs" crushed, filtered, dried and dumped in all our processed products contining eggs we pony up big bucks to buy -- which otherwise would be consigned to feed hogs, if not required to be disposed of as waste. Americans need a new author in the food field. The first to write the book titled: "American Foods--Or How Food Processors Turn Garbage Into Value Added Gold Foisted Off On The Public" would start in #1 position on best sellers and stay in the position for at least a year. I've HAD it with not being able to know for certainty where components originate used in our foods. Those of us who want to "buy American" and put our own nation's finances back in the black are kept in the dark deliberately. Enough with the deliberate duplicity.