Sunday, February 17, 2008
Where's the beef?
In the largest beef recall to date, 143 million pounds are being recalled going back to 2006. That means a lot of it has already been eaten. The reason this time is the failure to get the vet when cows went down on their way in. Sick cows apparently being preferable in the food supply than off the bottom line. Two points make this scary,
Federal regulations call for keeping downed cattle out of the food supply because they may pose a higher risk of contamination from E. coli, salmonella or mad cow disease because they typically wallow in feces and their immune systems are often weak.And
Officials estimate that about 37 million pounds of the recalled beef went to school programs, but they believe most of the meat probably has already been eaten.They can eliminate the E.coli and salmonella threats but the mad cow possibility won't be known for a few years yet. Sen. Tom Harkin, chairman of the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry asks a very pertinent question.
[H]ow much longer will we continue to test our luck with weak enforcement of federal food safety regulations?Probably as long as it takes to rid the government of Republicans.
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