Food safety

A broad coalition of business and consumer groups is requesting that the Senate schedule a vote on food-safety legislation "at the soonest possible date."

Twenty-two organizations representing the food industry, consumers and public health advocates wrote to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last week to urge action on the bill. On Monday five of the signing groups held a joint press conference at the Grocery Manufacturers Association to urge passage of "strong food-safety legislation [that] will reduce the risk of contamination and thereby better protect public health and safety." 

The stalled legislation would give the Food and Drug Administration power to recall tainted food, quarantine geographical areas and access food producers’ records. Similar legislation passed the House in July 2009.

The Senate Health Committee voted out the Senate version November, and unveiled a bipartisan manager's amendment at the beginning of the August recess. As a result, advocates were hoping for quick and easy passage of the legislation this month, but Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) is objecting on the grounds that the bill strengthens already inefficient government agencies and isn't paid for over the long term.

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) on Wednesday outlined his concerns with food-safety legislation that's pending in the Senate.

In a detailed entry on his Web site, Coburn in particular raised concerns with duplication and overlap of responsibilities between the Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Coburn also objected to the bill's $1.4 billion price tag over five years, not including $230 million directly offset by new fees. 

In the absence of guaranteed future appropriations, Coburn writes, "at best we are just passing it for a press release, and at worse, we shackle the FDA with unfunded mandates."

Coburn's objection might derail what could otherwise be smooth passage of legislation that has bipartisan support in the Senate. The House passed food-safety legislation in July 2009.

The bills in the House and Senate would give FDA the power to recall tainted food, quarantine geographical areas and access food producers’ records.

Energy and Commerce Democrats on Tuesday wrote to the owner of an Iowa egg farm linked to a recent salmonella outbreak that has sickened 1,519 people to demand answers about positive salmonella tests at the farm prior to the recent incident.

Wright County Egg owner Austin DeCoster has agreed to testify at an oversight subcommittee hearing next Tuesday. His farm received 426 positive results for salmonella between 2008 and 2010, according to documents obtained by the panel, including 73 samples that were potentially positive for the strain linked to the recent outbreak.

Wright County Egg did not share that information in its response for documents ahead of the hearing, prompting Tuesday's letter.

"When you testify before the Committee," the letter states, "we ask that you come prepared to explain why your facilities tested potentially positive for Salmonella Enteritidis contamination on so many occasions, what steps you took to address the contamination identified in these test results, and whether you shared these results with FDA or other federal or state food safety officials."

The letter is signed by Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Bart Stupak (D-Mich.).

Senate Judiciary Chair Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) on Monday introduced a bill that would create a new criminal offense for any individual or corporation that knowingly distributes tainted food products. The bill also establishes fines and prison sentences of up to 10 years for those convicted of such a crime.

The new bill, known as the Food Safety Accountability Act, comes in the wake of a massive recall of tainted eggs linked to salmonella poisonings. 

Leahy said Monday he has placed the bill on the agenda for his panel's business meeting scheduled for Thursday.

"The American people should be confident that the food they buy for their families is safe," Leahy said in a statement. "The Food Safety Accountability Act will hold criminals who poison our food supply accountable for their crimes. The fines and recalls that usually result from criminal violations under current law fall short in protecting the public from harmful products. Too often, those who are willing to endanger our children in pursuit of profits view such fines or recalls as just the cost of doing business. This common sense bill increases the sentences that prosecutors can seek for people who knowingly violate our food safety laws."

Egg graders with the U.S. Department of Agriculture were present at two Iowa egg processors at least 40 hours a week before they were involved in a national salmonella outbreak, USA Today reports.

The staff charged with inspecting the size and quality of eggs at Wright County Egg and Hillandale Farms were also supposed to check for rodents and other disease-spreading vermin, the newspaper reports. But the USDA says its egg graders only look for vermin in the processing buildings where they're based.

The Senate is expected to take up food safety legislation this fall that would increase the Food and Drug Administration's authority. Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), chair of the House Appropriations Agriculture subcommittee, has asked the USDA for more information about what its egg graders knew of conditions at the plant.

"It has never been more clear that we need to pass strong FDA food safety legislation this year," said DeLauro. "In the long term, a single food agency is needed that focuses exclusively on protecting our food supply."

"USDA has been working to close gaps and improve the safety of the meat, poultry and processed egg products over which we have authority and the FDA is taking action to address the fact that they have not had all of the tools needed to prevent outbreaks in areas where they have authority, such as shell eggs," Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack told USA Today.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein pushed back this week against the argument — aired recently by voices on both sides of the aisle — that she's obstructing a food safety bill moving through Congress.

"I have never expressed opposition to it, nor have I refused to allow it to move forward unless my BPA legislation is in the bill," the California Democrat wrote Friday in Politico. 

The "BPA" reference is to Feinstein's proposal to ban the use of Bisphenol A (BPA) in children's food and beverage containers. A toxic chemical linked to cancer, BPA is used in countless plastic products, including water and baby bottles. Feinstein is hoping to attach her amendment to a food safety bill Senate Democrats want pass later this year. 

The House sponsor of that legislation, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), has already made crystal-clear his concerns that such an addition could sink the underlying bill — a proposal the 84-year-old Michigan Democrat has been pushing for years.

“Time is running out,” Dingell wrote to Feinstein in July. “Our choices are becoming increasingly clear, we can either find middle ground, or we can become obstinate in our views and fail to meet any of our goals."

The House passed the Dingell bill almost 14 months ago, by an easy margin of 283-142.

Former GOP Rep. Bob Barr (Ga.) this month also went after Feinstein for allegedly obstructing the bill. Her amendment, Barr wrote Wednesday in Politico, is "a poison pill" in the eyes of many lawmakers because "banning the use of BPA in food packaging would make canned and packaged food much less safe, even as it would make those products much more expensive, because there are simply no viable alternatives yet developed at a reasonable cost.

"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the president need to take Feinstein to the woodshed and explain all this to her," Barr wrote.

In her response to Barr Friday, Feinstein took on both allegations head on.

"What I have asked for is the opportunity to offer an amendment to the bill that would ban BPA from children’s food and beverage containers," she wrote. "A simple up-or-down vote — that’s it."

As for Barr's claim that there are no alternatives to BPA: "This is inaccurate," Feinstein writes. 

"My amendment does not include a ban on general consumer products and cans. It would phase out BPA in children’s food and beverage containers: baby bottles, sippy cups, baby food and infant formula — all of which have alternative, safe, BPA-free packaging."

Senate leaders are hoping to take up the food safety bill later this month after Congress returns from its summer vacation.

Regulators are considering expanding the health reform law's requirement on calorie listing beyond chain restaurants, The Wall Street Journal reports.

The Food and Drug Administration released draft guidelines last week stretching the scope of the law beyond restaurants with 20 or more locations to also include airlines, trains, grocery-store food courts, movie theaters and convenience stores that qualify as chains.

The FDA has said it will finalize the regulation in December. Penalties for non-compliance begin next year.

The Democratic leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee have scheduled a hearing next month to examine the government's response to the recent nationwide recall of hundreds of millions of eggs potentially contaminated with salmonella.

Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), chairman of the full committee, and Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), who heads the E&C oversight subpanel, have already requested documents surrounding the episode from the Food and Drug Administration, the Agriculture Department and the two Iowa-based companies that have recalled more than 500 million eggs in recent weeks.

But they also want to have a public airing when Congress returns. 

A hearing of the oversight panel is set for Tuesday, Sept. 14. A list of witnesses has not yet been made public. 

This post was updated at 1:55 p.m. 

President Obama on Thursday announced his intention to recess-appoint Elisabeth Hagen as under secretary for food safety at the Department of Agriculture. 

The recess appointment comes as Congress prepares to debate food-safety legislation that would greatly expand the Food and Drug Administration's powers to regulate the nation's food supply.

Hagen, who is currently the department’s chief medical officer, has "been instrumental in building relationships and fostering coordination with food safety and public health partners at the federal, state, and local level," according to a White House press release.

Obama also announced he would appoint Richard Sorian as assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services.