President Obama’s recent radio speech tackled food safety issues head on. While it’s encouraging to see this getting much needed attention, it struck me as being a little ambivalent.
On the one hand, he indicated that the agencies that inspect our foods and test the safety of our medicines provide us with one of the safest places in the world to buy groceries or medication. He said that Americans can trust that there is a strong system in place to ensure safety.
At the same time, he acknowledged that in recent years we’ve seen a number of serious problems with contaminated food making its way to the grocery shelves and our homes. He specifically noted the spinach outbreak in 06, the peppers salmonella outbreak in 08 and the most recent peanut butter outbreaks.
On the one hand, while he applauds our system, he recognizes that there has been an alarming trend with troubling statistics. For example, the average number of outbreaks from contaminated produce or other foods has grown to nearly 350 a year up from 100 a year in the early 90’s. He attributes this, in part, to the laws governing food safety in America that have not been updated since the time of Teddy Roosevelt.
According to the President, the FDA is underfunded and understaffed. He says the agency only has the resources to inspect 7,000 of the 150,000 food processing plants and warehouses each year. This means that some 95% go uninspected, and he concludes this is a hazard to public health and unacceptable.
It’s good to see this problem front and center on his radar screen; hopefully he will take meaningful action.
Richard J. Arsenault, 2011
