[UPDATES AT END: 1) The FDA has appointed a "food safety czar," 2) FDA Coalition lobbies Congress -- support them!, and 3) VIDEO of Waxman's opening remarks, and The Gavel blog's report]
First, Henry Waxman's Oversight Committee is holding a live hearing on the "FDA's Vital Mission and Challenges for the Future." Watch/listen here. (NEW: Waxman's Opening Statement -- see latest update.)
BREAKING NEWS from the House Committee on Energy and Commerce:
Contamination of Chinese Wheat Gluten Widespread
Dingell, Stupak Dispatch Investigators to West Coast Ports
Reps. John D. Dingell, the Chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, and Bart Stupak, Chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee today dispatched Committee investigators to the west coast to pursue reports of extensive melamine contamination of wheat gluten, rice protein, and other vegetable protein.
It is important to note, as did Christie Keith in her recommended diary, that the FDA has now expanded its investigation to a wide array of food ingredients imported from China.
This comes from the important USA Today story today that has just been updated:
FDA limits Chinese food additive imports
The Food and Drug Administration is enforcing a new import alert that greatly expands its curtailment of some food ingredients imported from China, authorizing border inspectors to detain ingredients used in everything from noodles to breakfast bars.
The new restriction is likely to cause delays in the delivery of raw ingredients for the production of many commonly used products.
I'm posting this diary now, but will be adding more background information. But I want to get this up so you can listen in on Waxman's live hearing with three former FDA commissioners and the current FDA commissioner. Watch/listen here. And, in the last update below, check out the YouTube video of Waxman's opening statement, along with coverage from The Gavel blog.
This is an important paragraph of the USA Today story:
Now for the products to reach U.S. foodmakers, the importers will have to prove to the FDA that they are safe. The ingredients restricted include wheat gluten, rice gluten, rice protein, rice protein concentrate, corn gluten, corn gluten meal, corn by-products, soy protein, soy gluten, mung-bean protein and amino acids.
Our government is finally getting it. We are all in peril from the adulteration of a myriad of food products.
Our pets were the "canaries in the coal mine." Our pets have paid with their lives -- thousands of dead cats and dogs -- and many, many thousands more are very ill, and their owners are incurring thousands of dollars, per pet, in veterinary costs.
The original International Herald Tribune story, published on Sunday and then pulled for a major re-writing before its joint publication at the top of Monday's New York Times, contained this highly disturbing paragraph:
In recent years, for instance, China's food safety scandals have involved everything from fake baby milk formulas and soy sauce made from human hair, to instances where cuttlefish were soaked in calligraphy ink to improve their color and eels were fed contraceptive pills to make them grow long and slim.
Think about that.
They made soy sauce from human hair.
They made "fake" baby formula.
How can we responsibly trust ANY food product coming out of China?
I hope that the Energy/Commerce committee's investigators go far and wide, and dig deep, at our West Coast ports, and help consumers feel confident, once again, that we are getting SAFE food.
Thank you, John Dingell, Bart Stupak, and Henry Waxman.
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For more background on the expanding food recall, please see Jhritz's diaries.
SEE ALSO: Today's recommended diary by Christie Keith, a syndicated columnist for Pet Connection, which is also a terrific source for up-to-date information on the expanding food recall crisis:
BREAKING: FDA says thousands of pets dead, Chinese import alert expands
by ChristieKeith
Then there's a mainstay of the pet food crisis, Itchmo.com blog, whose owner Ben stays on top of all the key news stories every day, and who has also built a highly informative forum section for discussion of everything, from brands of pet food to home-cooked recipes to action ideas and alerts.
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Update [2007-5-1 14:31:49 by SusanHu]:
FDA Creates Food Protection Job
May 1st, 2007
Details are not clear about how this new position will be funded or how the agency will change, but someone has been tasked with the job of protecting our food supply at the FDA. An internal FDA director was promoted to this position. ...
Currently, Dr. Acheson serves as chief medical officer and director of the Office of Food Defense, Communication and Emergency Response at the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN).
In his new role, Dr. Acheson will work with individual FDA product centers, as well as the Office of Regulatory Affairs to coordinate FDA’s food safety and defense assignments and commitments.
In addition, Dr. Acheson will serve as the commissioner’s direct liaison to the Department of Health and Human Services, of which FDA is a part, and to other U.S. departments and agencies on food safety and food defense related inter-agency initiatives.
-- From Itchmo.com
(NEW: Waxman's Opening Statement at the beginning of today's Oversight hearing with three former FDA commissioners and the current FDA commissioner.)
Update [2007-5-1 14:31:49 by SusanHu]:
This is an important resource for overhauling and improving the FDA: The FDA Coalition.
I recommend you visit the The FDA Coalition site, and sign up for its news alerts.
One of the Coalition's advisers, William Hubbard, is a former top-ranking FDA official. He and I have corresponded, and he is lobbying Congress for significant budget and staffing increases.
Hubbard is quoted in the excellent Los Angeles Times article from last Friday, "A national food security plan exists, but it's stalled," on the FDA's existent, but unimplemented, food safety crisis plan (prepared post-9/11):
"The bottom line is that the United States is being overwhelmed with food imports, and they are not being screened by the FDA," said William Hubbard, a former FDA associate commissioner for policy and planning.
"A lot of time and effort went into it, and the best minds of the agency were brought in," he said of the import protection plan. "It wasn't approved or disapproved. It was basically, 'We can't do this because we have no money. This is all good stuff, and it should be done, but we don't have money.' "
There is, however, a new urgency. The chemicals implicated in the pet deaths, identified as melamine and cyanuric acid, were found in protein ingredients used in human foods, ranging from bread to veggie burgers.
[...]
A coalition of industry and consumer groups lobbying for major increases in the FDA budget estimates that the overall food program — with an annual allocation of about $440 million now — needs an additional $125 million a year for the next five years.
"The budget has been steadily cut at the FDA, and therefore, the vulnerability is steadily going up," said Hubbard, who is among those campaigning for more money for food safety programs.
Update [2007-5-1 16:10:31 by SusanHu]:
-- Video of Henry Waxman's opening statement for today's Oversight hearing on the FDA.
SEE ALSO: Jesse Lee's terrific blog from the Speaker's office, The Gavel, which today features:
Oversight Hearing on FDA Mission
May 1st, 2007 by Jesse Lee
As noted this morning, the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is holding a hearing: “The FDA’s Vital Mission and Challenges for the Future.” The Federal Drug Administration (FDA) plays a large and influential role in the health and safety of the American people. FDA is responsible for ensuring that drugs and devices are safe and effective, and that food is uncontaminated and properly labeled. As Chairman Henry Waxman explains in his opening remarks, the hearing marks the first of a series designed to bring competence and efficiency back to federal agencies. Text of Chairman Waxman’s opening remarks >>
READ ALL and VIEW the video.
Special thanks to The Gavel for sending me these videos and the blog entry.