U.S. consumers, it seems, will end 2010 in much the same fashion as they spent the rest of the year. They’ll have to worry about a salmonella outbreak tied to the nation’s food supply chain. So far, no deaths have been reported and the number of cases and states involved is relatively small. Still, the fact that tainted food — in this case alfalfa sprouts — has reached the public is reason for concern.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Tuesday that at least 94 cases in 16 states had been reported, more than half of them in Illinois. The state is home to Tiny Greens Organic Farm. The agency said its initial investigations connect the outbreak to that farm in Urbana. Consequently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration advised the public not to eat either alfalfa sprouts or a mix called spicy sprouts, which contains radish, clover and alfalfa sprouts, produced by the farm.
The warning is well taken, but how and why it was issued raises questions about the way the nation’s current food-safety system operates. The farm’s owner says that none of the samples taken from his farm by either state or federal agencies has tested positive, a fact confirmed by spokesmen from the Illinois Department of Health and the FDA. If that’s the case, Bill Bagby Jr. asks, why has the public been warned to avoid his produce because of possible but not proved contamination.
The reason, FDA spokesman Siobham DeLancey says, is that the agency doesn’t need positive microbiological results to issue a warning. In the current case, she said, the warning was issued because “the epidemiological evidence is so strong.” That evidence comes from interviews with the salmonella victims. Most are from Illinois and said they ate a sandwich with sprouts on it made at a Jimmy John’s store. Tiny Greens Organic Farms supplies the sprouts to franchise shops in the region. That connection prompted the warning.
It is probably wise for the FDA to err on the side of caution in this and similar incidents. Earlier salmonella outbreaks tied to a variety of foods have been more widespread, caused far more serious illnesses and resulted in several deaths. If the current warning is sufficient to halt this outbreak, then the agencies involved have done their jobs.
Still, there is a better, more efficient and certainly fairer way to accomplish the task. Congress recently passed a food-safety bill that gives the FDA more authority in such instances. That includes the power to issue a mandatory recall, rather than the consumer warning issued this week. It has not been signed into law. It should be. The new law probably won’t stop all outbreaks of salmonella and related threats, but it certainly should streamline and enhance the government’s ability to protect public health.