Food safety, one pistachio at a time
Pistachio growers probably won’t agree, but the New York Times says in an editorial this morning that the recent blanket warning from the Food and Drug Administration about salmonella in pistachios was one of the most encouraging events in years and sent a powerful signal to those in the food business that the F.D.A. planned to focus more urgently on the safety of consumers.
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The editorial concludes that even though the Obama F.D.A. appears to be doing a better job, Congress needs to beef up the agency’s staff and broaden its recall authority. Longer term, Congress and the White House need to keep promises to take a deeper look at food safety. It is time to think seriously about establishing one federal agency to coordinate and enforce food-safety regulations — and give consumers the protections they need and deserve.
FDA takes action on Salmonella in pistachios
Salmonella has been detected in two of the 200 environmental tests of the California processing plant operated by Setton Pistachio of Terra Bella, Inc. that has already recalled 2 million pounds of potentially contaminated pistachios, the New York Times reported yesterday.
Additionally, a joint inspection of Setton’s plant by the FDA and the California Department of Public Health found that Setton employees often used the same transport bins, conveyors and packing machines for both raw and roasted pistachios. Kraft suggested last week—after issuing their own recall—that cross-contamination between raw and roasted nuts could have been the issue.
On Monday Setton expanded its recall to include all lots of roasted in-shell pistachios and roasted shelled pistachios that were produced from nuts harvested in 2008.
FDA officials told the NY Times that the agency’s interim head, Dr. Joshua Sharfstein, hoped to avoid some of the problems associated with the ongoing Peanut Corp. recalls and started conference calls over the weekend with as many as 40 agency officials conversing about the appropriate next steps.
“The food industry needs to be on notice that FDA is going to be much more proactive and move things far faster,” said Dr. David Acheson, associate commissioner for foods at the Food and Drug Administration. “We’re going to try to stop people from getting sick in the first place, as opposed to waiting until we have illness and death before we take action.”
That, of course, sounds like an excellent plan.
Swift action, though, means taking some broad precautionary steps that many in the pistachio industry have already expressed concern over. They don’t want the mistakes of one company to reflect badly on all of them. FDA, impressively, is trying to be mindful of that and is pointing interested consumers to a list industry organizations have constructed of products that are not linked to the Setton recall.
This proactive mindset, coupled with attention to industry concerns, is actually reminiscent of the FDA’s approach to the Salmonella Saintpaul outbreak last summer. But no one appreciated it then.
If the FDA can continue to dialogue with members of the food industry—including whistle-blowers like Kraft and concerned pistachio growers—and clearly communicate its plans to consumers, it may have a terrific shot at salvaging its reputation as an agency committed to the health of consumers and supportive of the success of food producers with the same commitment.
It might also be able to reduce the number of people that get sick from food. That would be most appreciated.
Salmonella in pistachios: He Said, She Said
It’s on, bitches.
After a production manager for Setton Pistachio's sister company in New York said yesterday Kraft Foods did not tell Setton until recently that they had detected salmonella-tainted pistachios last year, Kraft offered a timeline of Salmonella-positive events. Kraft spokeswoman Susan Davison said,
Workers at one of Kraft's manufacturers in Illinois turned up a contaminated batch of fruits and nuts in December 2007. Then, in September of last year, another positive sample appeared.
Only after thousands of tests could the company pinpoint the source for the second positive test as California-based Setton Pistachio of Terra Bella, Inc. … Kraft finally determined pistachios caused last year's problem in March, when their manufacturer in Illinois detected salmonella for the third time - this time in the nuts, the only common ingredient between the second and third batch of trail mix. Kraft has not traced the source for the first positive salmonella test in 2007.
"If we did detect salmonella, of course we would never ship our products. We conducted extensive testing of all our food, and we were just unable to zero in until March that pistachios were the root cause."
Setton Pistachio then retracted the production manager’s statement.
On Friday, the Food and Drug Administration sent out a letter to the pistachio industry reminding nut processors to follow good manufacturing practices to protect consumers, something food safety experts called welcome guidance.
Oh, and before it was an Ashley Tisdale song, He Said She Said was a bad 1991 romantic comedy about competing newspaper advice columnists. They’d be blogging for free today.
Pistachios had tested positive for salmonella for months
Every time the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issues a public advisory about some food product, the armchair critics pounce.
This time it’s pistachios. On March 30, FDA issued a blanket warning for folks not to eat pistachios or products containing pistachios until further details emerged. The nut industry went … nuts. Perishable Pundit Jim Prevor did his bit about how regulators and others could be sure the contamination went back to the pistachio plant. Several journalists asked me about the economic burden of such a recall, especially since there were no confirmed illnesses. I told CBS Radio that if industry wanted an economically prudent plan, industry should keep Salmonella out of pistachios.
The other aspect is that, given the public and government scrutiny of FDA, there is probably something going on – something is not quite right at the farm or processing plant or wherever – for FDA to issue a blanket warning. FDA just doesn’t have all the details yet.
Here are some details:
Elizabeth Weise of USA Today is reporting this morning that Setton Pistachio, the company that recalled 2 million pounds of pistachios on Monday, had been receiving positive salmonella tests for as long as five months.
David Acheson, FDA associate commissioner, said,
"The question is, 'Did Setton Farms have an ongoing problem, and what did they do about it?' "
The FDA believes batches of pistachios that tested positive for salmonella were destroyed, not distributed. Setton Pistachio spokeswoman Fabia D'Arienzo could not confirm that.
Almond Princess Linda Harris, an expert on salmonella in nuts at the University of California-Davis, said,
"If I'm getting a positive (result) and a couple of months later another positive, and then another, I would think the appropriate response would be to say, 'This is not right. I've got to figure this out.' "
Kraft spokeswoman Susan Davison said Kraft sent an internal food-safety auditing team to Setton Farms’ Terra Bella plant on March 23 and,
"They saw the potential for cross-contamination" between raw and processed pistachios. “For example, often in companies different colored gloves are used for the raw area and the roasted area." However at the Setton plant, the same colored gloves were used in both areas.
Kraft unit recalls Salmonella-tainted trail mix; it's the pistachios
Back to Nature Foods Co., a Wisconsin firm owned by Kraft Foods Inc., issued a nationwide recall Wednesday on its Nantucket Blend trail mix because some of the pistachio nuts tested positive for Salmonella.
And the pistachios came from a supplier to the Georgia Nut Company, which found the Salmonella through its own testing.
The press release from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said,
This possible contamination is not connected with the recent outbreak associated with peanuts or peanut butter and no cases of Salmonellosis have been reported in connection with the recall.
Back to Nature Foods products are sold in Chicago area Dominick’s, Jewel, Target, Wal-mart, Whole Foods, Wild Oats, Hy-Vee, Kroger, Meijer and Woodman’s stores, as well as at military commissaries.
Casey did a quick search and found there have been no Salmonella outbreaks or reported positives associated with pistachios, although 2006 Good Agricultural Practice documents suggest limiting exposure of pistachios to irrigation water and carefully handling on-farm manure because of the possibility of microbial contaminants. It appears there's a widespread belief that the hull protects the edible parts, and drying and roasting further mitigate risks of contamination, although the GAP document and research on other nuts has concluded such assumptions remain unverified.
