snow-moon: 20070429

on assurances from the FDA

Food Safety System Broken - The Boston Globe

WASHINGTON -- Regulators don't have the money, equipment, and staff to keep industrial chemicals, salmonella, and E. coli from contaminating the US food supply, former commissioners of the Food and Drug Administration said.

"Simply put, our food-safety system is broken," said David Kessler, who headed the agency from 1990 to 1997.

"The reality is that there is currently no mandate, no leadership, no resources, nor scientific research base for prevention of food-safety problems," Kessler told the House Oversight Committee yesterday.

Lawmakers from both parties demanded changes at the FDA, which they said has failed to meet modern challenges in its duties to approve new drugs and to monitor the safety of the food supply. They cited recalls of pet food containing an industrial chemical, peanut butter with salmonella, and spinach with E. coli bacteria.

"Incompetent government can have deadly consequences," committee chairman Henry Waxman, a California Democrat, said as the panel heard from FDA Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach and three of his predecessors. "The FDA is an agency in crisis. We need to act now."

Before the hearing, Von Eschenbach named David Acheson, 51, director of the FDA's food defense office, to a new position created to coordinate food safety.

Congress has expanded the FDA's responsibilities since 1994 without providing enough funding, Waxman said.

The Senate is debating a reauthorization of the law governing the FDA's drug-approval process. The legislation would increase fees paid by the industry and require more active surveillance of potential health risks of medicines after they go on the market.

There's a bipartisan consensus the FDA needs an overhaul, said Representative Tom Davis, a Virginia Republican. "In recent years, the FDA has stumbled through some high-profile missteps," he said, citing the withdrawal of Merck & Co.'s painkiller Vioxx from the market in 2004 after it was linked to heart attacks and strokes.

Donald Kennedy, FDA commissioner from 1977 to 1979 and now editor of Science magazine, said the agency has suffered from a lack of funding and staff. Its budget would need to be increased from $1.56 billion in fiscal 2007 to $2 billion in fiscal 2008 to fully restore its capabilities, he said.

"If we expect to have our spinach uncontaminated, our pet food safe, Congress has to give the FDA more resources," Kennedy said.

"We've seen a rapid transformation of the food safety system due to advances in production technology, rapid methods of distribution, and the globalization of food sources," von Eschenbach said.

what's for dinner?

Christie Keith liveblogs the FDA

Bush appointees:
putting the con back into consumer protection since 2001

meanwhile, over at the Department of Health and Human Services

New HHS deputy secretary is Bush’s former debate prepper...

& READ

Richard Blair: Food Chain in Crisis

They’re killing the live animals that are contaminated, but they won’t issue a recall for those link sausages or chicken breasts that you’ve had in your freezer for the past month. And, nearly two months into this thing, they still can’t (or won’t) say if the melamine-laced protein enhancers made it into a human food manufacturing process. That’s patently bullshit - or should be. I’ve worked in the bulk raw materials industry, and I can tell you with a certainty that they should know every movement of these products through first, second, and probably third level distributors by shipment and lot number. Armed with that information, it doesn’t take a lot of CSI work to find out what food manufacturers may have used the products in human food production.

I’m not smart enough to know what the overall response should be at this point, but I do know that if this is how the Bush regime’s federal agencies would deal with a terrorist-inspired spiking of our food chain, we’re in some deep, deep trouble. This is sounding a lot like the Mayor of Amity telling the tourists that there are no problems - go ahead and take a swim and don’t worry about that shark fin out in the bay…

Putting the "F" Back in FDA
by Mike Nizza - The New York Times

. . . the agency says it is “overwhelmed” by the territory it is charged with policing, and the problem won’t be solved simply with a bigger budget or more regulatory power, the agency’s food safety chief, Robert E. Brackett, told The [Washington]Post:

“We have 60,000 to 80,000 facilities that we’re responsible for in any given year,” Brackett said. Explosive growth in the number of processors and the amount of imported foods means that manufacturers “have to build safety into their products rather than us chasing after them,” Brackett said. “We have to get out of the 1950s paradigm.”

IMPORT ALERT IA9929

IMPORT ALERT IA9929

Wheat Gluten
Rice Gluten
Rice Protein
Rice Protein Concentrate
Corn Gluten
Corn Gluten Meal
Corn By-Products
Soy Protein
Soy Gluten
Proteins (includes amino acids and protein hydrosylates)
Mung Bean Protein

don't expect your local health food store to protect you- or to understand the scope of the problem. Most of these ingredients are considered "natural" and are in many of the analog meat products we consume (not to mention "supplements"). Ever read the label on those energy and protein bars?

ASK QUESTIONS! READ LABELS!

the take home lesson here: buy fresh, local and organic -- and bake your own bread!

excerpt:

In recent weeks, there has been an outbreak of cat and dog deaths and illness associated with pet food manufactured with vegetable proteins contaminated with melamine and melamine related compounds. In response to this outbreak, FDA has been conducting an aggressive and intensive investigation. Pet food manufacturers and others have recalled dog and cat food and other suspect products and ingredients. This has been one of the largest pet food recalls in history, a recall that continues to expand. Thus far, 18 firms have recalled product, 17 Class I and 1 class II, covering over 5,300 product lines. As of April 26, 2007, FDA had received over 17,000 consumer complaints relating to this outbreak, and those complaints included reports of approximately 1950 deaths of cats and 2200 deaths of dogs. The Agency is working with federal, state, and local governments, academia, and industry to assess the extent of the outbreak, better understand how melamine and melamine related compounds contributed to the pet deaths and illnesses, and to determine the underlying cause of the contamination.

As of April 26, 2007, FDA had collected approximately 750 samples of wheat gluten and products made with wheat gluten and, of those tested thus far, 330 were positive for melamine and/or melamine related compounds. FDA had also collected approximately 85 samples of rice protein concentrate and products made with rice protein concentrate and, of those tested thus far, 27 were positive for melamine and/or melamine related compounds. FDA's investigation has traced all of the positive samples as having been imported from China.

we don't know means we don't know

The effects of melamine on people are thought to be minimal, but no one really knows. Its consumption by humans is considered so improbable that no one has even studied it.

~ Chicago Tribune

we are not aware of any human illness that has occurred from exposure to melamine or its by-products. While the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention systems would have limited ability to detect subtle problems due to melamine and melamine-related compounds, no problems have been detected to date. To further evaluate any potential harm to humans, the FDA is developing and implementing further tests and risk assessments based on the toxicity of the compounds and how much of the compounds consumers could be expected to actually consume.

~ FDA

When companies cook pet food, melamine and cyanuric acid could fuse into something lethal. Maybe the heat combines those two substances with yet another compound in the chow, producing deadly crystals. To test all that, he figures, you'd have to feed animals stuff that would bring activists running. "To do that kind of work," says Ebel, pondering the magnitude, "it would be a Ph.D. project."

~ Cornell University toxicologist Joe Ebel in The Oregonian

So... when you hear that "melamine is not believed to be harmful to humans" a parenthetical phrase used by CNN, the FDA, the CDC- and some Chinese farmers- remember that they have NOTHING on which to base that claim.

dangerous products

did you catch this one?

Experts said the counterfeiting problem was a consequence of China's economic policy, which has encouraged local provinces to pursue growth at all costs.

Many provincial governments protect pirate manufacturers as long as they generate profits and taxes.

"There is an outdated belief among local officials that they can only kickstart development in their areas by fostering low-price industries producing fakes," said Huang Guoxiong, a professor at People's University.

"But the prevalence of so many dangerous products has become frightening. They don't only cause economic losses, they threaten consumers' lives."

Why do we import ANY food products from China - whether intended for animals OR humans?

what's in YOUR pantry?

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Health officials are now looking at whether humans may have consumed food containing a chemical linked to a recall of pet foods and livestock feed, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Tuesday.

FDA officials said they would inspect imports of six grain products used in foods ranging from bread to baby formula for traces of melamine, a chemical thought to have killed and sickened cats and dogs.

- - - - -

Melamine, a chemical used in plastics and fertilizer, has already been found in wheat gluten and rice protein imported from China for use in some pet foods, triggering a recall of more than 100 brands.

The FDA named the six grain products to be inspected as wheat gluten, corn gluten, corn meal, soy protein, rice bran and rice protein.

"We're going to target firms that we know are receiving imported products," said David Acheson, chief medical officer of the FDA's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition in a conference call with reporters. "The goal is obviously to sample as much as we can."

FDA examines if pet food contaminant in human food

and, in case you missed it:

In recent years... China’s food safety scandals have involved everything from fake baby milk formulas and soy sauce made from human hair, to instances where cuttlefish were soaked in calligraphy ink to improve their color and eels were fed contraceptive pills to make them grow long and slim.

also, careful reading reveals:

More than 130 countries ship food items to the United States. Canada, Mexico and China have led the way, with China shipping nearly five times as much in food items to the United States as it did in 1996, international trade commission figures show. Beverages, fish, nuts and fresh fruits and vegetables are among the categories showing the biggest growth.

There have also been increases in categories like residues and waste from food industries; prepared animal feed and "gums, resins and other vegetable saps and extracts,” the trade commission said. “Emulsifiers” or “stabilizers” found in chewing gums and candies, for example, come from sub-Saharan Africa and Pakistan, Mr. Hubbard, the former FDA official, said.

Imports of milling industry products like wheat gluten, while still small, have more than doubled in value since 1996. Food processors use glutens to raise protein content and thicken everything from candy bars to pet food.

“In the same meal these days we may be eating food from several regions of the world,” said Caroline Smith DeWaal, the director of food safety for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a Washington lobbying group. “These food processors may be looking for a cheap new source, but they may pay for it down the line.”

it's not just a "pet food" story

“For the life of me I cannot understand why the terrorists have not attacked our food supply- because it is so easy to do."
- December 2004 - Tommy G. Thompson, former Secretary, HHS

“If people really knew how weak the FDA program is, they would be shocked."
- William Hubbard, former associate commissioner, FDA

Food Imports Often Escape Scrutiny
1 May 2007, Alexei Barrionuevo - New York Times