Who is Responsible for all These Foodborne Illnesses?

Foodborne illnesses have become commonplace in the United States.  The recent outbreak of listeria in products prepared at the Boars Head meat processing plant in Virginia has renewed public concerns over the safety of commercially available foods.  The Boars Head outbreak has resulted in nine deaths, and 57 hospitalizations across 18 states, as well as the recall of over seven million pounds of meat.  According to a freedom of information act request obtained by CBS News, the Virginia plant has been cited 69 times over the past year for “non-compliances” including instances of “bugs, mold, and mildew”.  Perhaps even more shocking, the federal government estimates that approximately 48 million episodes of foodborne illness and 3,000 deaths occur each year in the United States.

Who is responsible for all these foodborne disasters? The answer is not as clear as it should be.  Everything you eat is regulated by one of two federal agencies. The first agency, the Department of Agriculture or USDA was formed by Abraham Lincoln in 1862 and is industry-based.  The USDA is responsible for overseeing farming, ranching, forestry, regulating the quality and safety of approximately 20% of all foods, including most meats and eggs, and nutrition labeling upon all foods. 

 The meats for which the USDA is responsible, include beef, pork, lamb, and poultry, but exclude game meats and exotic meats.  Meats are regulated under either the Federal Meat Inspection Act (FMIA) or the Poultry Products inspection Act (PPIA) which focuses upon inspections. The USDA is likewise responsible for eggs and egg products outside of the shell, but not eggs while still inside the shell. Egg products are regulated under the Egg Products Inspection Act (EPIA) and are likewise focused upon inspections. The USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service or FSIS has one or more full time inspectors in every meat packing and meat processing plant across the United States.

The second agency, the Food and Drug Administration, or FDA, was founded in 1906 by Theodore Roosevelt and is product-based. The FDA, an agency of the Department of Health and Human Services, is responsible for ensuring the safety of human and animal foods, human and veterinary drugs, biological products, medical devices, cosmetics and products that emit radiation.  The foods for which the FDA is responsible include 80%+ of our nation’s food supply, excluding those meats, eggs, and egg products under the jurisdiction of the USDA.  The FDA regulates these foods under the Federal, Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FFDC) and the Public Health Service Act, neither of which are focused upon inspection.  Although, the FDA is responsible for ensuring the safety of 80% of the foods consumed in the United States, most of such foods are never inspected.  Unlike the USDC, the FDA does not place inspectors in plants or regularly inspect all food products, absent a complaint or cause for doing so.  

The FDA and USDA also differ over how they inspect imported foods and food products.  This is critical, since the United States imports about 15% of its food supply, from 200 countries, through 125,000 food producers, accounting for 32% of vegetables, 55% of fruits, and 95% of seafoods. The FDA  requires less inspection upon these imports than does the USDA, focusing upon company-specific inspections and requiring importers to register with the FDA prior to importing foods.  In contrast, the USDA ensures the country from which the products are imported meets or exceeds USDA requirements after which each imported product is visually inspected by the USDA at every port of entry.  

The jurisdictions of food safety outlined above, become far more blurred, when applied to individual food products.  For example:

• The FDA regulates all fish, shellfish, and seafood, except farm raised catfish which is regulated by the USDA.
• The FDA regulates eggs in the shell, but the USDA regulates all egg products outside the shell.
• The FDA regulates all dairy products.
• The USDA regulates all meat products containing 3% or more raw meat, but the FDA regulates all meat products containing less than 3% raw meat.
• The FDA regulates all packaged foods.
• The USDA regulates all fruits and vegetables, but once processed into other products they are regulated by the FDA.

Critics have suggested that the FDA and USDA should be merged into one agency for the sake of economy and efficiency.  So far, that has never passed the suggestion stage.

To make matters even more confusing, some foods are regulated by both the USDA and the FDA.  For example, a food product that includes both meats or egg products along with other foods would be regulated by both agencies.  The USDA would regulate and inspect the meat or egg products, whereas the FDA would regulate, but not necessarily inspect the other food products in the food. 

Finally the producers of food and food products are initially and primarily responsible to reduce and eliminate all food borne illnesses.  Of course, some would say this is like allowing the “fox to guard the henhouse”!  Nonetheless, when the 3,000 instances of food borne illnesses appear every year, most never hit the press, and the few that do seldom mention the USDC or FDA.   At this point, it appears the USDA is not taking responsibility for the recent outbreak of listeria at the Boars Head plant in Virginia.