FDA spanked by Obama
President Obama will be ordering the Food and Drug Administration under review this week. As an avid food eater, I am shocked that it has taken this long for someone to finally ask “where has the FDA been?” While they seem hardnosed with drugs, they have faltered as of late with food. Whether it is the standards that are slipping or the inspections themselves remains to be seen.
Obama’s order comes after the well known salmonella outbreak caused by peanut butter that has affected over 500 people. While the number seems low, the actual amount of those affected could be much larger. Symptoms are flu like and some can recover without hospitalization. Also, the peanut butter company who is at fault for this outbreak has been testing positive for contamination since 2007. How can a company go this long without anyone stepping in? While jar peanut butter is still safe, literally tons of industrial peanut butter has been shipped all over the country and put into hundreds of everyday products – like those crackers you are eating while reading this.
This isn’t the first time that food has made it to consumers covered in bacteria. This past summer was marked by the tomato scare. Tomatoes were no longer available at any restaurant and most super markets. I was denied my pico at Chipotle and my yummy tomato slice at Burger King! We went three weeks without tomatoes only to find out that it was actually jalapeño peppers that were the culprits. Before the tomatoes was the spinach. E coli was running rampant on the best-for-you vegetable. While kids around the world celebrated, many were angered at the idea of actually dying from the vegetable we were promised “wasn’t going to kill us.”
The latest development is mushrooms. (read the article here: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,486534,00.html) However, unlike the peanut butter catastrophe, this company is actually doing its own recall and not waiting two years to see how it goes first. While I’m not an ideal candidate to die of listeria, my grandmother is. Hopefully with the FDA under review, food will become a little safer for us all again.
