Report: Food-Borne Illnesses Cost $152B

(AP)  Food-borne illnesses, such as E. coli and salmonella, cost the United States $152 billion annually in health care and other losses, according to a report released Wednesday by a food safety group.

The report comes as the U.S. Senate considers legislation that would require more government inspections of food manufacturers and give the Food and Drug Administration new authority to order recalls, among other things. The House passed a similar bill last year.

The government estimates 76 million people each year are sickened by food-borne illness, hundreds of thousands are hospitalized and about 5,000 die. Recent outbreaks have resulted in large recalls of peanuts, spinach and peppers.

The financial cost determined in the new report published by the Produce Safety Project, an initiative of the Pew Charitable Trusts, was significantly higher than the $35 billion reported by the Agriculture Department in 1997.

That analysis looked only at some health costs related to a handful of pathogens, said author Robert L. Scharff, an Ohio State University assistant professor of consumer sciences and former Food and Drug Administration economist.

Scharff's study examined government data on all food-borne illnesses and included a broader set of economic losses. They included the costs of emergency and ongoing medical care, pain and suffering and death.

The peer-reviewed report also assigned costs to food-borne illnesses whose source was not identified, which the federal government estimates is more than three-fourths of all cases.

The report did not include costs associated with food recalls or to industries involved, which are also substantial, Scharff said.

"The take away message from the report is that this estimate demonstrates that food-borne illness is a serious burden to our society," said Sandra Eskin, director of Pew Charitable Trusts' food safety campaign. The group is a member of the Make Our Food Safe coalition that includes other public health and consumer safety groups pushing for food safety legislation.

U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., called the costs "shockingly high" and said the U.S. needs to reduce the risk of these preventable illnesses.

"If people can't engage in this issue because of the humanitarian aspect or the public health aspect, maybe they're willing to listen because of the economic aspect," she said in a conference call with reporters.

The Agriculture Department inspects meat and poultry and shares inspection of eggs with the FDA. The FDA inspects most other foods, but at least 15 government agencies are a part of the food safety system.

The Agriculture Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Dr. Jeff Farrar, FDA's associate commissioner for food protection, said the agency had not had an opportunity to review the report.

"We welcome all contributions toward a better understanding the impact of food safety in the United States," he said. "The cost of food-borne illness is undoubtedly high and underscores the need for rapid passage of bipartisan legislation to provide new food safety tools for FDA."

[debinok1]

When cattle are put on open range they eat grass, when cattle are put on mega corps lots they stand in mud saturated with manure all day eating corn. The digestive tract of cattle does not digest corn well, it sits in their stomachs fermenting and growing bacteria(ecoli). The mud they stand in all day is swarming with ecoli and every cow on the lot has it. When these cattle are slaughtered, the meat is treated with ammonia to kill the ecoli. The manure from these cattle is then used as fertilizer and sprayed over our fruits and vegetables. Mega corps chickens are kept in hot, airless, over filled, metal buildings, where they walk through feces and over dead chickens. Salmonella breeds in these types of chicken coops, it then spreads to the chickens. When these chickens are slaughtered they are washed in bleach to kill the salmonella and their feces is sold as fertilizer that is then sprayed over our fruits and vegetables. Manure from these animals that is not sold as fertilizer is washed into our creeks, streams, and rivers, where it ends up in our drinking water. How about for once the FDA and the USDA do their jobs and protect our food and water supply, make the mega corps do things the right way and we would not see nearly as many food-borne illnesses.

[sjc_1]

This figure is WAY too high and measures must be taken immediately and become the norm. Yes, it costs tax payer dollars to have inspectors and make growers follow the rules, but that is a down payment compared to this.

[Funky-President]

PUBLISHED SEPT 4, 2001.


nytimes.com/2001/09/04/international/04GERM.html ?pagewanted=all

"The projects, which have not been previously disclosed, were begun under President Clinton and have been embraced by the Bush administration, which intends to expand them.

Earlier this year, administration officials said, the Pentagon drew up plans to engineer genetically a potentially more potent variant of the bacterium that causes anthrax, a deadly disease ideal for germ warfare."

"A published account of the experiment, which appeared in a scientific journal in late 1997, alarmed the Pentagon, which had just decided to require that American soldiers be vaccinated against anthrax. American officials tried to obtain a sample from Russia through a scientific exchange program to see whether the Russians had really created such a hybrid. The Americans also wanted to test whether the microbe could defeat the American vaccine, which is different from that used by Russia.

Despite repeated promises, the bacteria were never provided.

Eventually the C.I.A. drew up plans to replicate the strain, but intelligence officials said the agency hesitated because there was no specific report that an adversary was attempting to turn the superbug into a weapon.

This year, officials said, the project was taken over by the Pentagon's intelligence arm, the Defense Intelligence Agency. Pentagon lawyers reviewed the proposal and said it complied with the treaty. Officials said the research would be part of Project Jefferson, yet another government effort to track the dangers posed by germ weapons.

A spokesman for Defense Intelligence, Lt. Cmdr. James Brooks, declined comment. Asked about the precautions at Battelle, which is to create the enhanced anthrax, Commander Brooks said security was "entirely suitable for all work already conducted and planned for Project Jefferson."