Wenonah Hauter, Executive Director of Food & Water Watch, has responded to USDA's claims that their email telling inspectors to not interfere with industry collection of Salmonella data was appropriate. In a statement she said that, "what was troubling about the email was that it told the district managers that the purpose of the data collection was for the industry to develop its own voluntary pathogen performance standards that it was going to enforce on poultry processing plants. It went on to say that FSIS inspection personnel assigned to the plants were not to interfere with the National Chicken Council data collection and that they had no right to look at the data that was collected. "In other words, the poultry industry would create the standards for pathogen levels in … [Read more...]
USDA Tells Staff Not to Interfere with Poultry Industry Voluntary Pathogen Reduction Effort
Food & Water Watch has obtained an internal email by the USDA regarding a new data collection effort by the National Chicken Council. According to the email, The National Chicken Council is spearheading an effort to "collect samples from chicken parts from most all poultry establishments in order to collectively work on voluntary pathogen reduction performance goals that the industry will self-impose using their own industry-wide aggregate data." The email, dated January 17, 2014 and sent to USDA-FSIS district managers, states that the USDA approves of the National Chicken Council effort and does not want in-plant USDA-FSIS inspectors and field supervisors to question this effort or to take steps to force poultry processing plants to turn over the results of the sampling. The email … [Read more...]
Chicken Safety and Cross-Contamination Issues in Restaurants
A study published in the Journal of Food Protection has found there is a big problem in restaurants and chicken preparation. The study found that many restaurants do not follow the FDA Food Code guidance about cross-contamination prevention and proper cooking, and that managers do not have the basic food safety knowledge about chicken. Forty percent of managers said they "never, rarely, or only sometimes designate certain cutting boards for raw meat." One-third of managers said they did not wash and rinse surfaces before sanitizing them. Over half of managers said thermometers weren't used to determine the final internal temperature of chicken. And more than 50% of managers did not know the safe final internal temperature of cooked chicken. Finally, more than half of the managers rinsed … [Read more...]
Don’t Want Chicken from China? Sign the Petition!
Food & Water Watch has been speaking out against the USDA's decision to allow poultry products processed in China to be sold in the U.S. The USDA has admitted that China's poultry slaughter program is not equivalent to the U.S. program, so chickens raised in China cannot be exported to the U.S. But the American government is considering letting the Chinese food industry process chickens raised elsewhere. The plan will save agribusiness money, since processing costs are lower in China. But since there will be no U.S. inspectors in China watching the processing process, there's no guarantee the Chinese companies won't use Chinese-raised chickens. The poultry that's cooked and processed in China will not be labeled as such, because of a loophole in the country of origin labeling rules. … [Read more...]
Consumer Reports: Most Chicken Harbors Pathogenic Bacteria
A new report to be published in the February 2014 issue of Consumer Reports finds that 97% of the chicken breasts they tested harbor pathogenic bacteria. Most deaths from food poisoning in the U.S. are attributed to poultry. So Americans must now assume that the raw chicken they bring into their houses is a hazard. Scientists analyzed more than 300 raw chicken breasts purchased across the U.S. More than half of those samples contained at least one bacterium that was resistant to three or more antibiotics. The Foster Farms outbreak this fall is just one example of the problem. Forty percent of those sickened in that outbreak were hospitalized, which is double the usual percentage, because the bacteria were antibiotic resistant. That makes salmonellosis much more difficult to treat. In … [Read more...]
Chinese Chicken Proves Unfit
Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch, has released a statement on the USDA's decision to let processed chicken from China enter U.S. borders. This decision was made a few weeks ago, but yesterday USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service admitted that China's poultry slaughter system is not equivalent to the U.S. system. That means China is not eligible to ship poultry products made from Chinese-raised chickens to the U.S. Ms. Hauter said, "China's food safety record is horrific and there are serious concerns with avian influenza. We have also just learned that USDA Secretary Vilsack is scheduled to visit China next week. We sincerely hope that this visit will not be a prelude to a new audit of the Chinese poultry slaughter system. USDA should stop wasting … [Read more...]
Should Salmonella Victims Sue Foster Farms for Outbreak Linked to Chicken?
The hundreds of Salmonella victims sickened by Foster Farms chicken should not be left to bear the financial responsibility of the outbreak. The company allegedly produced chicken contaminated with antibiotic-strains of Salmonella Heidelberg. People who were sickened after eating this chicken have to pay medical bills incurred because of their illness. There may be good evidence linking the Salmonella Heidelberg infections to Foster Farms chicken. The epidemiologic evidence is persuasive. When health officials interviewed 132 people sickened in the outbreak, 105 of them (80%) reported eating chicken prepared at home in the week before becoming ill, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Of the 61 people in this group that had brand information, 48 (79%) … [Read more...]
Second Foster Farms Chicken Salmonella Outbreak in 15 Months
The large West Coast Salmonella outbreak associated with Foster Farms Chicken -- announced on Monday -- is the second big set of Salmonella poisonings associated with the brand in 15 months. The first outbreak, which began June 1, 2012, sickened 132 people in 13 states, according to the "final update'' provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in July of this year. That one was centered heavily in the Pacific Northwest: Washington, 57 cases; Oregon, 40; Alaska, 13; and California, 11, according to the CDC's Morbitity and Mortality Weekly Report dated July 12, 2013. Three months later, the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service is issuing a public health alert warning the public that raw Foster Farms chicken from three plants is associated with 278 illnesses in … [Read more...]
Senator Questions USDA About Safety of Meats from China
Last week, Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) questioned the USDA over the safety of meats imported to the U.S. from China and the adequacy of the food safety inspection program in that country. Earlier this month the USDA announced that meats processed in Chinese facilities will be allowed into American markets with no label indicating where they were processed. Brown said in a statement, "given the well-documented shortcoming of the Chinese food safety system, we shouldn't allow unmarked meat into our markets that is processed in Chinese facilities that are not subject to food safety inspections. This action could endanger the health and safety of American consumers and potentially undermines confidencee in our nation's food safety standards." The equivalency standard that was granted to … [Read more...]
Audits of Chinese Plants Set to Export Cooked Poultry to U.S.
After the USDA announced that they were going to let Chinese facilities export processed poultry to the U.S., Food & Water Watch asked to see copies of the audit reports, which were not released. USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) posted the audits last Friday, and there are some serious issues in those plants. In the Qingdao Nine-Alliance Group, Shandong, auditors saw long electrical cords bundled with pieces of wire and repaired with electrical tape that made them difficult to clean. An air-line water trap was not closed and sealed, so its contents sprayed over the area. More problems with electrical cords were found in Zhueheng Waimao Co., Ltd/Shandong Delicate Food Co., Ltd, Zhueheng, Shandong, and at Weifang Legang Food Co. in Shandong, there were structural … [Read more...]
