The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is reportedly short the $2.75 million needed to establish five food safety centers of excellence around the country.
The centers were included in the 2011 Food Safety Modernization Act, but budget constraints have prompted the CDC to wait until enough targeted funding is available before going ahead.
The report of a shortfall comes out of Minneapolis, where the University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health established a working group to develop criteria for evaluating the would-be centers. Craig Hedberg, a food safety expert at the school, said the working group received a memo from the CDC laying out the issue.
The memo reportedly said that a slight increase in food safety funding will help address urgent food safety priorities, but isn’t enough to establish the food safety centers.
U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar, D-Minnesota, provided the initial push for the centers in the wake of the nationwide Salmonella peanut butter outbreak in 2008 and 2009 that killed three Minnesotans and six others around the country.
Source: Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP)
