WASHINGTON (CNN) - Despite sweeping
reform of food safety laws intended to make what we eat less dangerous,
the number of Americans falling ill or dying from contaminated food has
increased 44% since last year, according to a report released Wednesday.
Tainted cantaloupe, unsafe mangoes, meat and the recent peanut
butter recall -- which so far has infected 25 people, mostly children,
in 19 states -- has left consumers struggling to keep up with the
dizzying list of ever-changing toxic edibles.
Approximately 48
million people get sick from eating tainted food each year, the report's
authors, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group said, arguing more
must be done to protect Americans from unsafe food.
The report
says there were 718 illnesses directly linked to food recalls in 2011.
There were 1,035 illnesses from January to September 2012 -- an increase
of 44%.
Two years ago, President Barack Obama signed into law the
Food Safety Modernization Act, a vast piece of legislation giving the
Food and Drug Administration, among other things, more power to be
proactive holding food suppliers responsible for foodborne illness
outbreaks.
But while some parts of the law have been enacted, the
vast majority of the law's regulatory framework remains in limbo,
sitting in the White House Office of Management and Budget, with no
clear timetable for implementation.
When asked about the delays,
OMB spokeswoman Moira Mack told CNN, "We have taken key steps, including
putting out a food safety rule cracking down on salmonella in eggs and
expanding E. coli testing for beef. We are working as expeditiously as
possible to implement the food safety legislation we fought so hard for.
When it comes to rules with this degree of importance and complexity,
it is critical that we get it right."
The report also takes issue with the delayed response and plans in Congress to cut FDA funding.
"In
February, the president's budget requested $4.5 billion for the Food
and Drug Administration. But budget proposals in both the Senate and the
House fall below this target, coming in $600 (million) to $700 million
below full funding, which the Office of Management and Budget has called
'harmful' to food safety regulations," the Public Interest Research
Group says.
The group's report also says the FDA hasn't been able
to keep up with increased demands for inspection of imported foods.
Nearly 15% of food consumed in the United States is imported, and the
FDA's own data indicates two-thirds of the fruits and vegetables on
American's dinner plates are from foreign food suppliers.
Yet in 2008 the FDA inspected only 153 of roughly 189,000 registered foreign food facilities.
Instead of improving, the problem of foodborne outbreaks is getting worse, the report says.
"When
comparing 2010 infection incidences with national health objective
targets ... the only incidence rate that meets the target goal was the
incidence of infection with E. coli O157," the report says. "The
incidence of salmonella was three times the 2010 national health
objective target, which is especially alarming, as salmonella causes the
majority of hospitalizations and deaths from foodborne disease."
The
report argues the FDA needs to be provided with funding, develop
concrete and specific standards for inspection at all facilities,
perform more unannounced inspections, coordinate with other agencies
such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and put more
resources toward monitoring the causes of foodborne illness.
For
its part, the FDA told CNN, "The rule-making process can take time, and
we are working diligently to get this right. We are confident the end
result will be a solid framework to strengthen and modernize our
nation's food safety system."
The Public Interest Research
Group's report joins a growing chorus of food safety advocates demanding
increased scrutiny of the U.S. food supply and those calling for
complete implementation of the Food Safety Modernization Act.
The
group helped design the framework for the Consumer Financial Protection
Bureau, the federal agency created to regulate the banking industry's
consumer marketing tactics. Whether Wednesday's scathing report will
lead to similar results remains to be seen.
