One Year After Salmonella Egg Outbreak, Unsanitary Conditions Persist
One year after a Salmonella outbreak that sickened 1,900 people and prompted the recall of a half-billion eggs, government inspectors are sill finding that many Iowa egg farms are unsanitary and lack adequate measures to prevent Salmonella from causing illness in egg consumers, according to an investigative report by the Des Moines Register.1
In fact, many of the state’s major producers aren’t even meeting minimum federal standards designed to protect consumers from illness, the newspaper discovered after filing a request under the Freedom of Information Act.
Furthermore, the egg salmonella outbreak and egg recall apparently have had no affect on reporting regulations or spurred more rigorous enforcement that would include fines and penalties. According to the report, Iowa egg producers are still not required to tell state officials if they find Salmonella on their farms and none of the violations has resulted in fines or penalties from state or federal agencies.
“The federal Food and Drug Administration says it has never fined or closed down any egg-production facilities in the United States,” the story states.
Key information was blacked out on some of the documents the paper reviewed including: the size of rodent infestations, the brand names under which the eggs are being sold, and the names of diseases documented on farms.
Among the problems outlined in the story:
- Inspections are announced days in advance, sometimes on dates chosen by the producers.
- Inspections are still based, in part, on the honor system.
- Insepctors do little on-site testing for Salmonella and instead rely on self-reported, in-house test results, even though laboratories performing those tests are not required to be licensed or accredited.
- Penalties for health and safety violations that could lead to Salmonella poisoning are nonexistent at both the state and federal levels.
For the past 10 years, Iowa has been the nation’s biggest egg producer, with 57 million hens producing 14 billion eggs each year, twice the output Ohio, the country’s second-largest producer, the report states. But the state does not lead the country in oversight of egg production. On a state-level, it does almost none, leaving that job to the federal government which is grappling with implementation of the new food-safety guidlelines that took effect last July.
1. http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20110828/NEWS/308280055/Register-investigation-Egg-farms-rack-up-violations?Frontpage
