FDA's food safety czar Acheson off to consulting
David, we hardly knew ye.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s most public food safety face since the 2006 E. coli O157:H7 outbreak in spinach, assistant commissioner for foods and barfblog.com fan, David Acheson (right, exactly as shown), is leaving to join a new consulting firm, headed by former Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt.
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Jane Zhang of the Wall Street Journal reported today that Acheson said, in an email to FDA employees,
“I wanted to let you know that Friday, July 31st will be my final day of service at the FDA. I have accepted a position with Leavitt Partners, a consulting firm, who are starting a new focus on food and import safety and have asked me to head the new activity.”
The firm, based in Salt Lake City, where Leavitt served as governor, already has hired a number of former HHS officials, including Medicaid chief Dennis Smith.
Acheson said in an interview he will remain in Washington and will use his “strong public-health perspective” to help food companies address food safety issues.
Acheson spoke in a July 2007 interview with the Washington Post about his passion for public education and his commitment to making the wobbly global food-safety system work better -- even though he's acutely aware that, in his new position, a food-related outbreak has as much potential to break his career as to make it.
Curb Your Enthusiasm again features L.A.'s restaurant inspection grades
I never liked the television series, Seinfeld.During it's original run from 1989 -- 1998, I rarely watched, and when I did, found the characters self-indulgent and whiny. Which they were. It just wasn't that funny.
Curb Your Enthusiasm by Seinfeld co-creator Larry David is much better.
For the second week now of the new season, the Los Angeles restaurant inspection signs -- in both cases A -- are prominently displayed.
Tonight, as Larry is waiting to get ice cream behind a sample abuser -- someone who asks to sample every flavor available -- a big L.A. restaurant inspection A is displayed in the window (thanks, Reece, for finding this pic).
Larry won't however take the $50 he is owed in a golf bet from the newly orphaned Marty Funkhouser after the death of his mother, preceded by the death of his father last year, because of its dodgy microbiological quality after being removed from the insole of Marty's jogging shoe.
Larry also says that the customer is usually "a moron and an a**hole."
But they pay. And they like their restaurant inspection disclosure letters (L.A.), colors (Toronto), or smiley faces (Denmark).
Orlando, this is directed at you.
