The beef recall: Where were the feds?

The Associated Press

Jack in the Box won't be using Westland/Hallmark beef anymore.

Featured Topic | Posted 28 weeks 5 days ago

The beef recall: Where were the feds?

It's the largest recall of beef in American history -- 143 million pounds of meat taken off the market after video showed a sick cow, unable to stand, was sent to slaughter at the Westland/Hallmark plant in Southern California. Most of the beef had gone to school lunch programs, and much of it had already been eaten.

Why didn't federal food inspectors catch the problem before the meat went to market? How can the system be improved?

Ben likes: Food fight? Actually, regulation is the problem

Cato

While many believe this to be a textbook case for more aggressive government regulation, a little investigation finds just the opposite.

According to the General Accounting Office, current U.S. Department of Agriculture food inspection practice "suffers from overlapping and duplicative inspections, poor coordination, inefficient allocation of resources, and outdated inspection procedures."

Joel likes: Hard to stomach

Los Angeles Times

Ten years ago, consumer watchdogs complained because the FDA was inspecting only about 2% of imported food. Now it's 1%. Too few FDA inspectors have been trying to stay on top of too many tainted products from China alone -- pet food, toothpaste, fish.

It's time for a little self-questioning alarm at the agencies that are supposed to ensure food quality. Instead, they show a disconcerting level of complacency. USDA officials are saying there's no evidence that beef from the sick animals at Hallmark Meat entered the food supply, though they can't say it didn't; and schools immediately stopped serving the meat. And even though it's illegal to process "downer" cattle for consumption because the symptoms can indicate mad cow disease, USDA Undersecretary Richard Raymond insisted that his agency "safeguards the safety and wholesomeness of our food supply." Not this time, apparently.