July 2009

 At 10:30 AM today, Agriculture Secretary Vilsack, HHS Secretary Sebelius, and Vice-President Biden will issue “key finding,” according to an email from Nick Shapiro, Office of the Press Secretary, in The White House, that was sent to several media outlets. According to press release, entitled President’s Food Safety Working Group: Delivering Results, the Obama administration is going to implement “a new public health-focused approach to food safety based on three core principles: (1) prioritizing prevention; (2) strengthening surveillance and enforcement; and (3) improving response and recovery.” Although these principles are laudable, and anything would be an improvement over the Bush administration’s efforts to put industry profits above the public health, most of what is being announced today is recycled from Clinton years, and all are incremental steps that seek improvements around the edges rather than the much needed structural change to the U.S. food safety system.

What follows is a point-by-point commentary and critique of today’s announced policy changes and renewed initiatives. As I think you will see, there is not a lot radical going on here. (Please click on the Continue Reading link to read more.)Continue Reading Back to the Future: Obama Recycling Clinton-Era Food Safety Initiatives as New

The first lawsuit stemming from the current E. coli O157:H7 (E. coli) recall by JBS Swift Beef Company of Greeley, Colorado that has been linked to 23 E. coli illnesses in California, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York and Wisconsin was filed today on behalf of an Albuquerque-area child who…

A little over two weeks ago, IBM released the results of a survey that it had conducted among adult grocery shoppers in the ten largest cities in the United States (100 in each city). The survey was intended to gather opinions about food safety issues, and what it found is as disappointing as it is not surprising. For example, less than 20% of consumers trust food companies to develop and sell food products that are self and healthy. Moreover, 60% of consumers are concerned about the safety of the food that they purchase. And the cause of this significant drop in trust? The rise in food recalls linked to contaminated and unsafe food products. According to the survey results, 83% of the people surveyed were able to name a food product that had been recalled in the last years, with nearly half (46%) naming peanut butter as a recently recalled product.

The irony here is that the rise in contamination-related recalls can be explained, in large part, by the drive for greater profits through: the use of cheaper ingredients purchased from suppliers willing to cut-corners (see, e.g. Peanut Corporation of America and its customer Kelloggs); the failure to update and maintain manufacturing facilities to ensure the highest standards of safety (see, e.g., Cargill and its peanut butter plant); insufficient product testing and quality control (see, e.g. Dole baged Spinach); and over-reliance on the consumer to cook the product "properly" as a means of making it safe, when it should have been safe to begin with (see, e.g., Banquet pot pies and Topps-brand and American Chef’s Selection brand frozen ground beef patties).  But by putting profits above safety, food manufacturers are trading short term gains for long term losses.  If consumers lose trust in manufactured food products, they will stop buying them.  Look, for example, at peanut butter sales, which still  have not recovered, and may never do so.

To read the full press release discussing the survey results, please click on Continue Reading.Continue Reading Consumer Trust in Food Safety in the U.S. Plummets Because of Rise in Recalls

According to the Jamestown Sun, health officials in Maclean County, North Dakota have linked an outbreak of Salmonella illnesses to an unlicensed caterer.  Aggie Jennings, who ran the catering company, has been ordered by health department officials to cease operations.   Patrons of three separate events catered by Jennings became ill last month.  According to the article:…

In a July 1 letter that appeared in the Stillwater News Press titled, "Know the Facts," Director of the Food Safety Division for the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry, Stan Stromberg, explained the milk pasteurization process:raw milk

In the High Temperature/Short Time process, which is typically used in milk pasteurization, the milk

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News yesterday from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), which is warning the public not to consume certain beef products described below because they may have been contaminated with E. coli O157:H7. This recall of beef products in Canada is related to the expanded recall of beef products in the USA by JBS Swift Beef…

The Cuyahoga County Board of Health confirms that three children have contracted E. coli O157:H7 bacteria. Two more cases are under investigation. The three children with confirmed cases also developed Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome (HUS).

"Five cases is very unusual for us to have," says Terry Allan, the health commissioner in Cuyahoga County. Allan says…