Enforceable National Standards Needed to Prevent Future E. coli Outbreak
The report entitled Investigation of an Escherichia coli O157:H7 Outbreak Associated with Dole Pre-Packaged Spinach has been issued by the California Department of Health Services and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on March 21, 2007.
While the precise cause of the bacterial contamination was not identified, the report highlights a number of health hazards involving the fault of the landowner, grower, packer and distributor of the spinach implicated in the outbreak that sickened over 200 people and killed at least three people.
The report shows there is plenty of fault to go around, including the manner in which the spinach was grown, harvested, cooled and processed. For example, with regard to the growth of the spinach, the report raises serious questions about the wisdom of growing ready-to-eat crops in close proximity to livestock and livestock waste, especially in the absence of detailed risk assessments intended to identify health hazards in or adjacent to the particular field in which the spinach was grown. The report also points to the need for water testing to determine fecal contamination, adequate standards for well construction and inspection and appropriate measures to prevent cross contamination by wild animals (in this case, there was strong evidence that feral pigs living in close proximity to the surrounding cattle and cattle waste tramped through the fields and spread the bacteria-laden feces on to the adjoining ready-to-eat spinach crop).
This spinach outbreak is hardly the first E. coli outbreak linked to leafy-green vegetables. In fact, in the last decade, there has been a score of such outbreaks resulting in injuries, death and economic loss that is almost impossible to comprehend. But here is the shocking part: despite this repetition of death and disease, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the California Department of Health Services, and the produce industry apparently have all gone on record against mandatory rules in favor of voluntary guidelines and industry self-policing. This is idiocy, pure and simple. As the west coast director of Consumers Union was quoted as saying, “How many more deadly outbreaks must there be?”
I have spent years representing seriously injured people harmed by foodborne illness outbreaks. In virtually every case, after the source of the outbreak has been identified, the producer responsible for the tainted product expends a great deal of time, energy and money trying to minimize the damage to the firm’s reputation. This damage control usually involves the hiring of experts and gnashing of teeth along with promises and commitments to implement new policies and procedures. Usually these new policies and procedures were well known but not practiced by the industry before the outbreak.
This pattern was repeated during the spinach outbreak. I watched one of the executives of NSF go before cameras and promise to assemble food safety experts and enact new practices that presumably would have prevented this outbreak from occurring in the first place. Why didn’t that happen before people got sick and died?
Until we force companies to take these precautions before their food products harm consumers, we will continue to see more of the same. Stringent rules and site specific analyses are required for every individual and entity along the production continuum extending from farm to table. As this and other outbreaks clearly show, food production is national and international in scope. That is why a relatively small field in one California county left a wake of misery that extends across our country. That is also why national standards are necessary to police agricultural practices and make sure they are finally made as safe as science and human ingenuity permit.
Fred Pritzker is founder and president of Pritzker | Ruohonen & Associates, P.A., one of the few law firms in the United States that practices extensively in the area of foodborne illness litigation. The firm has collected millions of dollars on behalf of victims of E. coli O157:H7 poisoning and other foodborne illnesses. For more information, visit http://www.pritzkerlaw.com or contact Fred Pritzker toll-free at 1-888-377-8900.
For the full text of The report entitled Investigation of an Escherichia coli O157:H7 Outbreak Associated with Dole Pre-Packaged Spinach, please go to http://www.dhs.ca.gov.
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