Fresh Produce E. coli and Salmonella Targeted by New FDA Rulemaking
Fresh produce E. coli and Salmonella outbreaks have prompted a review by the Food and Drug Administration that will lead to a proposed new safety regulation for the produce industry.
The rule-making process has been launched with four public meetings to elicit feedback and comments from growers and other produce safety stakeholders. About 100 people attended the first session in Rochester, New York, in February and three more meetings are scheduled for March and April in Columbus, Ohio; Tifton, Georgia and Hyattsville, Maryland.
Currently there are no mandatory national produce safety standards in place, but the FDA did issue voluntary guidelines in 1998. Jim O’Hara, director of the Produce Safety Project at Georgetown University, has said that many retailers and supermarkets have their own safety guidelines, but there is no set standard across the board.
There is also a voluntary leafy green growers safety pact started by the industry, but problems have continued.
Attention to food safety in fresh produce has followed such high-profile foodborne illness outbreaks as the 2006 spinach E. coli outbreak that killed three people and sickened more than 200. One of the victims was a 2-year-old child who contracted HUS E. coli, or hemolytic uremic syndrome, the leading cause of kidney failure in children
Lettuce and leafy greens are on the top of the list of the 10 riskiest foods regulated by the FDA.
Center for Science in the Public Interest, a nutrition watchdog group for consumers, said the food group has been linked to the most food poisoning outbreaks — 363 outbreaks from 1990 to 2006 — of any of the foods that it surveyed.
The outbreaks of lettuce E. coli O157:H7, Salmonella, Campylobacter, Norovirus and other pathogens have caused more than 13,500 illnesses, the report said. Manure, contaminated irrigation water, or poor handling practices are all possible culprits in those outbreaks.
The next three FDA “stakeholders’ meetings” for produce safety rule making will be March 11 at the Blackwell Inn in Columbus, Ohio; March 25 at the University of Georgia’s College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences in Tifton and April 7 at the Marriott Inn and Conference Center in Hyattsville, Md.
Tags: E. coli lawyer, lettuce outbreak
