Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Thought for Food

One of the most basic things we as taxpayers should expect from our government is that our food is safe. Thanks to the anti-government administration, this is no longer the case. Seems to me that safe groceries should be a basic right.

Updated: 7:13 p.m. MT Feb 26, 2007

The federal agency that’s been front and center in warning the public about tainted spinach and contaminated peanut butter is conducting just half the food safety inspections it did three years ago.

The cuts by the Food and Drug Administration come despite a barrage of high-profile food recalls.

“We have a food safety crisis on the horizon,” said Michael Doyle, director of the Center for Food Safety at the University of Georgia.

Between 2003 and 2006, FDA food safety inspections dropped 47 percent, according to a database analysis of federal records by The Associated Press.

FDA ‘just can't manage the job’
That’s not all that’s dropping at the FDA in terms of food safety. The analysis also shows:

  • There are 12 percent fewer FDA employees in field offices who concentrate on food issues.
  • Safety tests for U.S.-produced food have dropped nearly 75 percent, from 9,748 in 2003 to 2,455 last year, according to the agency’s own statistics.http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17349427/

Feeling the outrage? Rick Perlstein is:

E. coli conservatives


First, they came for the spinach.

I remember the day last September. The supermarket had a new kind of salad dressing, one that looked like it would taste good with spinach. I went to the produce section to buy a bag. But they all had been recalled. Three people had died from E. coli contamination from eating spinach. I decided I could live without the spinach.

Next they came for the peanut butter, and I didn't pay much attention. I don't much like peanut butter.

Then they came for the tomatoes. Then the Taco Bell lettuce.

Then the mushrooms, then ham steaks, then summer sausage. I started worrying.

Then, they came for the pet food.

I remember the sinking feeling, hearing that dogs and cats had died eating contaminated food. Then the flash of guilt—had we poisoned our dogs? I remember hearing the name of the manufacturer, my wife searching the web frantically for
a catalogue of its products, the stab of fear when we found the name of the food our own dogs eat. Then the wave of relief—it was only canned food; our dogs eat dry. I began investigating more. One of the things I learned was that the Food
and Drug Administration hasn't been able to confirm
"with 100 percent certainty" that the offending agent didn't go into human food. Then it neglected to reveal the name of the tainted product's U.S. distributor.http://commonsense.ourfuture.org/e_coli_conservatives


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