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Contact for Food Safety Modernization Act: FSMA@fda.hhs.gov
Melinda Hemmelgarn, M.S., R.D.
Independent journalist
What do spinach, peanut butter and 500,000,000 eggs have in common? They've made headlines for nationwide recalls due to fecal contamination and related illness and deaths.
Enter the Food Safety Modernization Act, signed into law on Jan. 4 and the subject of an AHCJ conference panel which debated the FDA's potential to prevent future contamination and related disease outbreaks.
Alicia Mundy, a Wall Street Journal reporter, set the stage by declaring food one of the most politicized issues in Washington. Then she called on three food-safety experts to discuss the legal and logistical realities of the new law: Michael Taylor, J.D., deputy commissioner for food at the FDA; Scott Faber, J.D., vice president, federal affairs for the Grocery Manufacturers Association; and Erik Olson, J.D., director, Food and Consumer Product Safety Programs at the Pew Charitable Trusts.
Taylor emphasized that the law will move FDA's focus from reaction to prevention and partnership with industry, consumers, and agencies ranging from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to state and foreign governments.
"Congress is saying it's the industry's responsibility to keep food safe," Taylor said, and the FDA has been given a critical role in setting standards and making sure those standards are met.
Faber agreed that prevention is the "primary strategy for food safety." But he described one of the challenges of our modern food supply: "We're importing far more food and eating things we didn't 15-20 years ago." For example, 15 percent of our total food supply comes from overseas; with 60 percent of fruits and vegetables, and 80 percent of seafood making up the majority of imports.
Olson reported that only 1 percent of seafood imports were typically inspected.
The new law requires food and beverage companies to have a food safety plan in place including risk analysis and prevention controls. Companies have to make those plans available to FDA for verification.
"In the absence of access to records, it was difficult for FDA to intervene and act preventively," Taylor said. Plus, FDA's new "authority to detain products provides a powerful shift to real-time protection."
Olson took a David Letterman approach, listing food safety problems and the solutions offered with the food safety law. Here are a few:
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Inspections: prior to the law, inspections had been once every 10 ½ years; the law has increased inspections to once every three years for high-risk food.
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Recalls: FDA had no recall authority prior to the law; all recalls had been voluntary. The law gives FDA permission to order mandatory recalls.
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Reaction: FDA moves from a reactive to a proactive, prevention-based agency.
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Authority. Previously, the FDA had no authority to issue violations to offenders; now the agency will be able to go to court.
Faber and Olson explained some specific consumer communication wins, including a requirement that retailers provide shoppers with better information on recalls, such as posted placards. The FDA also has a new center for communications.
There are a couple of caveats to the food safety news:
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Food safety comes at a price. The FDA can't implement the new food safety bill without the resources to do it. An investment in better epidemiology would allow the FDA to be more efficient at tracebacks, which get to the root cause of an illness. The question is: who and how will we pay?
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FDA (and the new food safety law) does not regulate meat and poultry. So we are left with the question: should there be a single food safety agency? Pew is looking at what food safety should look like in the future.
