DeLauro leads on food safety

2/22/08
It was a few years and several E. coli scares ago that the nation was introduced to the “downer cow,” a feedlot animal so ridden with disease that it couldn’t walk on its own. But, as we found to our collective disgust, such animals were not necessarily deemed unfit for human consumption. Indeed, many were pushed or otherwise moved to the slaughterhouse, where their meat mixed with that of all the other cows, to be consumed by anyone unlucky enough to be on the receiving end of this modern-day food chain.
Such practices, which are really just the most jarring of the altogether nausea-inducing routine of contemporary meat processing, were supposed to have ended. They didn’t, as The Humane Society proved recently by unveiling a video showing a major meat company turning downer cows into food. The revelation led to a nationwide recall of 143 million pounds of meat, much of which had been headed for schools (including those in Bridgeport).
Industry spokespeople have protested that there is no evidence of any sickness from the meat, and that the government is overreacting. For once, though, the government is showing the disgust that is called for.
U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-3, a longtime advocate of reforming food safety procedures, is urging the U.S. Department of Agriculture be stripped of its food safety responsibility. DeLauro, who chairs the appropriations subcommittee responsible for funding the USDA, said Congress will hold hearings on the matter beginning next month.
The USDA has proven its inability to handle the job it is tasked with, as legions of examples, from bad spinach to spoiled sushi, have shown. DeLauro should be applauded for recognizing the problem and working to find a better way. A top-to-bottom overhaul of our food safety net is in order, and DeLauro is the right person to lead this fight.
It’s easy to pass off this kind of story as being only about school cafeterias forced to juggle their lunch menus, but food safety is a pervasive problem. It gets about one one-thousandth the attention that threats of terrorism or violent crime receive, but deserves much more. Everyone eats, and nearly everyone is affected by food-safety decisions on the national level.
For her unceasing attention to important issues that might easily fall through the cracks, DeLauro deserves high praise.