After yesterday's news that the Blakely, Ga. peanut plant involved in the current peanut butter salmonella outbreak had a history of being cited repeatedly for unsanitary conditions, comes today's news from FDA that Peanut Corporation of America sold peanut products even after they tested positive for salmonella -
Federal officials said today that the company at the heart of the salmonella outbreak sold peanut butter or peanut paste even after tests showed it was tainted with salmonella.
The Food and Drug Administration found 12 instances in 2007 and 2008 when the Peanut Corp. of America actually identified salmonella in its own product but then put that on the market, sometimes after it was retested by a different lab that found no bacteria, said Michael Rogers, director of field investigations at the FDA.
Crossposted from La Vida Locavore, more below the fold...
As for the second part of the above quote from the Oregonian article, it appears that Peanut Corporation of America was shopping around for a lab that would give it the results it wanted after initially finding salmonella in its own tests. We'll find out much more soon, as FDA will be releasing the full findings of its investigation online tomorrow.
If this case ends up being good for anything, it will be to prove that we need serious reform in our food safety system, now. Not just more of the same with a friendly face. We need to drastically increase funding for food safety, and create an independent Federal Food Safety agency, something that Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D - CT) and others have been trying unsuccessfully to create for years now.
Also, in addition to the strain identified as having caused the current outbreak, it's being reported that officials have found 3 additional strains of salmonella during this ongoing investigation -
A congressional official briefed on the investigation said health officials have identified four types of salmonella as they focus on a Georgia facility. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is continuing. Salmonella Typhimurium is the strain that caused the illnesses. Two other strains were found on the floor of the facility and a third in a container of peanut butter from the plant.
Unfortunately, it looks like this recall of peanut butter and peanut paste products will continue to expand for some time; and the news of additional salmonella strains being found may also mean that the date range of affected products might be expanded, as well.
As I said yesterday, it's a shame that the companies and producers who do things the right way will also be affected by the criminal negligence of Peanut Corporation of America, but this certainly isn't the only example of incidents like this occuring in the processed food industry. While everyone's attention was focused on peanut butter products, just last week a Maine company quietly recalled over 6,000 pounds of frozen stuffed chicken products.
It really speaks volumes to the current state of things when it takes something as serious as multiple deaths and hundreds and hundreds of sicknesses across 43 states and Canada before problems like this actually become a major news story. We need change in our food system, now.
The latest peanut butter recall news can be found here, and the current list of recalled products is also available at the FDA's site.