Whenever I read about food-borne disease outbreaks from plants, I look for the reporter to state plainly that E. coli, salmonella, and listeria all come from animals and that a plant merely acts as a vector for them out of industrial agriculture onto our plates.
Again this time, no such statement.
No, I'm not a vegetarian. I just think people should know important facts.
All the reporting on salmonella in tomatoes omits the salient fact that the source the FDA is looking for is an animal source, probably either people or livestock. There is a vanishingly small chance of a wild source with reptiles the chief suspect in that case.
The media also failed to note from the beginning that last summer's fresh spinach, contaminated by E. coli, was tainted by an animal source. Of course, once the finding was confirmed, they did report it, but it was obvious before.
I suspect that the FDA scientists soft-pedal this knowledge out of deference to the industries they regulate. Especially under Republicans, the inmates are running the asylum.
Could it be any more obvious?
How many minutes in Iraq?Separately, the Government Accountability Office will release a report on Tuesday showing that the F.D.A. would need to spend at least $56 million more next year to begin full inspections of foreign plants. It would need to spend at least $15 million annually to inspect China’s drug plants every two years, which is the domestic standard.
Bush administration officials have acknowledged problems associated with poor inspection of overseas plants and have plans to improve the situation. But President Bush’s budget does not provide the F.D.A. with funds to hire more inspectors.
At its present inspection pace, the F.D.A. would need at least 27 years to inspect every foreign medical device plant that exports to the United States, 13 years to check every foreign drug plant and 1,900 years to examine every foreign food plant.
Remember when Big Pharma told us how dangerous drugs from Canada would be? Now they're buying ingredients from the cultural equivalent of meth labs in China:
Many workshops that make crude heparin are unregulated family operations.
When large sums of money are involved, people cheat - antidepressants, statins, whatever the FDA doesn't oversee carefully. And with Republicans in the executive, that means everything. Democrats might be better, or they might not.
So, next time you hear "9 out of 10 dentists recommend," think: If an ad says it, maybe they shot the other 90 dentists who didn't recommend. Same goes for Coke and Pepsi ads, except they can run as many trials as they need to get the "right" result.
It may be best to ban children's cold medicines due to their risks. But it's hogwash to do so on the basis of a claim that one study shows that they work no better than placebos. There's plenty of anecdotal evidence that they work and also plenty of anecdotal evidence that drug studies are not reliable at a count of one.
