By Jon H. Harsch
© Copyright Agri-Pulse Communications, Inc.
Washington,
Jan. 4 – Even before President Obama signed the bipartisan,
long-awaited “Food Safety Modernization Act” into law Tuesday,
Republicans threatened to withhold funding needed to improve federal
Food & Drug Administration (FDA) food safety measures. The new law aims at shifting FDA away
from its traditional approach of reacting to food-borne illness
outbreaks and toward USDA's preventative approach. As part of this
shift, the law for the first time gives FDA the authority to mandate
food recalls rather than rely on voluntary compliance. The goal is to
reduce the 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths in the U.S. each
year from salmonella, e. coli and other food contaminants. Any
reduction in these figures would also reduce an estimated $152
billion in health care and other costs linked to food-borne
illnesses. The new law is expected to boost FDA
spending by about $300 million a year. Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA),
tapped as the new chair of the House Appropriations subcommittee
dealing with agricultural issues, has questioned spending more on FDA
programs “In the face of a deficit that’s now $1.4 trillion and a
debt that’s 96% of GDP.”
Welcoming the law and her new
responsibilities, FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg commented
Tuesday that “The historic legislation the President has signed
directs the Food and Drug Administration,working with a wide range of
public and private partners, to build a new system of food safety
oversight – one focused on applying, more comprehensively than
ever, the best available science and good common sense to prevent the
problems that can make people sick.” Dr. Hamburg explained that “The idea
of prevention is not new. FDA has established prevention-oriented
standards and rules for seafood, juice, and eggs, as has the U.S.
Department of Agriculture for meat and poultry, and many in the food
industry have pioneered 'best practices' for prevention. What’s new
is the recognition that, for all the strengths of the American food
system, a breakdown at any point on the farm-to-table spectrum can
cause catastrophic harm to the health of consumers and great
disruption and economic loss to the food industry. So, we need to
look at the food system as a whole, be clear about the food safety
responsibility of all of its participants, and strengthen
accountability for prevention throughout the entire food system –
domestically and internationally.” Aware of threats to withhold funding
for provisions of the new law, Hamburg added that “we know that the
legislation did not include sufficient fee resources to cover the
costs of the new requirements. In that, we will look to Congress to
work with us to ensure that FDA has what’s needed to achieve our
shared food safety and food defense goals.” Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), a long-time
champion of food safety legislation and chair of the Senate Health,
Education Labor & Pensions Committee, said “Today is the
culmination of more than a year of bipartisan efforts to better
protect American families against contaminated food. We already know
what happens when we do not have effective food safety protections
and enough resources to enforce them – large-scale national
recalls, people getting sick from contaminated foods and agricultural
producers hurt by fears about the foods their industry produces.” Harkin said “When you consider that
food-borne disease outbreaks cost consumers and industry
approximately $152 billion a year, providing the FDA with
approximately $300 million per year to fund these new protections is
a bargain, and an important commitment for the Congress to make.
Fiscal responsibility does not necessitate abandoning or neglecting
the need of American consumers for safe food.” To return to the News Index page,
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