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Is the USDA truly promoting safe food for all Americans?. An assessment of today’s food safety legislation in the United States. What is available in a supermarket?. Some background information in order to better grasp the issue of food safety legislation . ?. Where does our meat come from?
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Is the USDA truly promoting safe food for all Americans? An assessment of today’s food safety legislation in the United States
What is available in a supermarket? Some background information in order to better grasp the issue of food safety legislation
? Where does our meat come from? Where does our milk come from? How safe are the processed foods available on the market?
? Genetically Engineered Food High Fructose Corn Syrup Bovine Growth Hormone and what else???
Thesis statement The food safety laws that the USDA and other federal food agencies are issuing are insufficient in assuring the consumer that the products they are buying are safe. • What is the current state of food legislation in the US • Why are these lawsinsufficient and inadequate?
Outline Food Safety Legislation in the US: I. What is working with the current food safety legislation? II. What still needs to be worked on? III. Conclusion: assessing the efficiency and sufficiency of US food safety legislation
Food Safety Legislation Today What isFood Safety Legislation and what do these laws say?
FOOD SAFETY AND INSPECTION Meat, poultry, and egg products inspection laws
Food safety activities “The activities these bureaucracies undertake may be divided into regulation of plant/factory sanitation, productinspection, restaurant inspection, consumer education, and compilation of diseaseoutbreakstatistics. These activities are shared by regulators at the federal, state, and local levels. In the federal government, fifteen agencies have legal mandates to provide food safety, with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), and the CDC playing major roles (Walker 2007).” YASUDA, TOMOHIDE. "Food Safety Regulation in the United States: An Empirical and Theoretical Examination." Independent Review 15.2 (2010): 201-226. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 24 Feb. 2011.
Key concepts • OUTBREAK: the CDC defines an outbreak as “the occurrence of two or more cases of a similar illness resulting from the ingestion of a common food” (CDC 2000). This definition makes the statistics comprehensive enough to be “the basis for public health action”(CDC 2000) • For example, after an E. coli O157:H7-contaminated hamburger outbreak in 1993 that killed four children, both the FDA and the USDA introduced several new regulations (Golan et al. 2004, 10)
USDA food safety education • “Be Food Safe means preventing foodborne illness through four easy steps: Clean, Separate, Cook and Chill.” (USDA 2010) bacteria, germs, cross-contamination, defrosting, safe-microwaving…
BUT what about ingredients? Labelling? Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs)? Milk standards? Food sources? Shouldn’t these factors also be regulated by food safety laws?
Are these safety regulations sufficient? The larger implications of food safety laws on the consumer’s health
Key words: Transportation Allergies Contamination Illnesses Food protection
“Product Specific Information” MILK SAFETY
New methodological tactic: looking at what is unsafe but allowed
3 Unsafe Ingredients Focus on • High Fructose Corn Syrup (processed foods, cookies, sweets) • Bovine Growth Hormone (milk) • GMO or other ingredient (TBD) • Link to the UNC community/ student population
High Fructose Corn Syrup John S. White, et al. "A Critical Examination of the Evidence Relating High Fructose Corn Syrup and Weight Gain." Critical Reviews in Food Science & Nutrition 47.6 (2007): 561-582. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 1 Mar. 2011.
Work left to do • Keep doing the detective work • Explore the unsafe food components that are found in food and how they are regulated • Assess the larger implications of food safety on health, accessibility, prices • Can the USDA and other food agencies change their structure to make it more health-oriented?