Darin Detwiler | Food Safety News

Parallels

Darin Detwiler — Fri, 22 Jan 2021 05:04:55 +0000

contriuted Opinion

On Wednesday, Jan. 20, I sat through a few meetings, delivered a presentation on food safety labeling, and was interviewed for a podcast on food safety. All of this work took place at my home as we are in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, I joined much of the nation as my attention was also drawn to a second monitor with the live coverage of the inauguration of Joe Biden as our 46th president.

In the middle of the interview, I could not help but acknowledge to the podcast hosts my sense of déjà vu — this day was eerily similar to that of 1993.

On Tuesday, Jan. 12, 1993, the University of Washington and Seattle’s Children’s Hospital filed a report with the Washington State Department of Health (DOH) about a perceived cluster of children with bloody diarrhea and Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome (HUS) likely caused by E.coli O157:H7. By that Friday, reportings increased rapidly to 40 cases of young victims being admitted to local hospitals and being airlifted to Children’s Hospital in Seattle. Within 24 hours, the DOH had enough information from victims and families that allowed them to develop suspicion of contaminated hamburger patties sold at a chain of fast food restaurants as a potential source.

Officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention would soon identify potentially related cases in California, Oregon, British Columbia Canada, and Nevada. By Monday, Jan. 18, 1993, DOH officials went public with an announcement about the source of theE.coli O157:H7 outbreak at a news conference that took place during that year’s Martin Luther King holiday weekend. After that press conference, executives at Jack in the Box — the identified fast food restaurant chain — agreed to stop serving hamburgers and quarantine their meat.

Two days later, on Jan. 20, 1993 — the day of President Bill Clinton’s inauguration — a powerful storm ravaged the Puget Sound area, which includes Seattle and King County, knocking out the power for hundreds of thousands of residents across three counties, leaving many homes and restaurants without power for refrigeration or cooking, and even leaving them without water for washing hands for a few days. Health officials tracked how many people were sick in an effort to determine if the outbreak was getting worse or if it had reached its peak. Data would later show that the peak took place between the dates of the DOH announcement of the source of the outbreak and the middle of the storm.

Dr. John Kobayashi, then a lead epidemiologist for Washington State, recalls that period of concern:

“The amount of conversations with the federal level at that time was enormous. It was very clear that we were not just dealing with a regional outbreak, that we were dealing with a national problem. And when things change from a regional outbreak to a national outbreak, it makes life a lot more complicated. But you also had the complication of the person-to-person infections. And that was a big concern.” (From my book “FOOD SAFETY: Past, Present, and Predictions,” 2020.)

By this time, the news of the 45 infected children who required hospitalization, 38 of whom suffered serious kidney problems and 21 required dialysis, found their place in the headlines and on the evening news.

Riley Detwiler

Only days after taking the oath of office, President Bill Clinton discussed the ongoing food safety situation on a live, televised “Town Meeting,” talking directly to live audiences in Detroit, Miami, and Seattle. The Seattle ABC affiliate invited me, as the father of 16-month-old Riley Detwiler, and Riley’s mother to attend the Town Meeting and tell the president about our son, listed in critical condition — sick with E.coli — in Seattle Children’s Hospital. In his response, President Clinton stated that “We can do more (meat) inspections in a more effective way, hire more inspectors, and do a better job. We can empower the inspectors to do more things.”

President Clinton flew out to Seattle and intended to visit my son, Riley. While en route, the president was informed of my son’s death, as Riley would be the fourth and final child to die in this landmark E.coli outbreak. President Clinton called me from Air Force One, expressing his condolences, his emotional reaction, and personal thoughts as a father. His words comforted me while inspiring me to continue being a father to my son through advocacy, education, and policy support.

By the time the outbreak was determined to be over, the E.coli contaminated meat had infected 732 people across California, Idaho, Washington and Nevada, with the majority of cases in Washington State. The pathogen killed four children and left 178 other victims with permanent injury including kidney and brain damage. The outbreak involved 73 restaurants of the fast food chain across four states.

Today, most news outlets put COVID-19 pandemic data at the top of the page or side of the screen — numbers of confirmed illnesses and numbers of deaths. As these numbers increase we must not forget that these also reflect the numbers of families whose lives may never return to normal and those families who will live with a chair forever empty at the family table.

Similar to President Clinton in 1993, President Biden’s call for unity during his inauguration must not be seen by us as purely political. Unity is found in our vulnerability as well as in our resolve. Unity is part of the Herculean effort needed to end this pandemic and to overcome our many challenges ahead.

About the author: Darin Detwiler, LP.D., M.A.Ed., is the founder and CEO of Detwiler Consulting Group LLC. He is also the assistant dean at Northeastern University’s College of Professional Studies and the lead faculty of the Master of Science in Regulatory Affairs of Food and Food Industries. He is an internationally recognized and respected food policy expert with more than 25 years’ experience in shaping federal food policy, consulting with corporations, and contributing thought leadership to industry events and publications, advising industry, NGOs, and government agencies, and addressing food safety and authenticity issues in the U.S. and abroad. In 2018, Detwiler received the International Association for Food Protection’s Distinguished Service Award. Detwiler is the author of FOOD SAFETY: Past, Present, and Predictions (Elsevier, 2020); and Building the Future of Food Safety Technology (Elsevier, 2020).

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His chair at the table is still empty

Darin Detwiler — Mon, 20 Feb 2017 19:21:02 +0000

Exactly 24 years ago today my 16-month-old son Riley died from E.coli/HUS during the 1993 “Jack in the Box” outbreak. He was the last of the four young children who paid the ultimate price for failures in food safety protocols at that time.

The landmark outbreak is often referred to as the 9/11 of the food industry. In the many years since, we have gained new federal policies, advancements in science and in reporting data collection, and even a whole new “culture of food safety.”

I was 24 at the time and have now literally lived half of my life in the shadow of that event. Rarely a day goes by without reading of an illness, an outbreak, a death, or some other news item that reminds me of the faults in my early assumptions of the government or the industry solving the problems with food safety.

According to estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the years since my son died have witnessed over 1.1 billion Americans becoming ill, almost 3.1 million Americans hospitalized, and 72,000 American deaths due to foodborne pathogens. Most of these illnesses and deaths could have been prevented.

Some outbreaks and deaths were unintentional and could have been prevented with stronger policies and better training. Other incidents, unfortunately, have causes linked to greed and intent. A few notable trials — Peanut Corporation of America, the DeCosters of Quality Egg, etc. — show that some are able to consider the worst impacts on the lives and health of consumers as a cost of doing business. This should never be a cost that consumers, especially the young and vulnerable, should be expected to bear.

Today, I am a food policy professor, columnist, and food industry consultant. I gain much satisfaction in knowing that for every company that has failed to prevent such impacts on public health, hundreds of other companies place a high priority on food safety. They invest in ensuring that their products are going to be safe and wholesome.

While many, if not most food companies understand their role in preventing another illness or another death, far too many victims and families know the true burden of disease.

Too many homes in this country include a chair forever empty at a family table due to food safety failures.

Darin Detwiler

About the author: Darin Detwiler, founder and president of Detwiler Consulting Group, LLC, is the director of the MS in Regulatory Affairs of Food and Food Industry and Professor of Food Policy at Northeastern University in Boston. In addition to serving as the executive vice president for public health at the International Food Authenticity Assurance Organization, Detwiler serves on numerous committees and advisory panels related to food science, nutrition, fraud, and policy. He is a sought-after speaker on key issues in food policy at corporate and regulatory training events, as well as national and international events. Detwiler holds a doctorate of Law and Policy.

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Change is what’s predictable about the future of food safety

Darin Detwiler — Sat, 10 Sep 2016 05:01:29 +0000

The third-annual Food Safety and Analysis Congress, held earlier this week at Cripps Court Auditorium on the beautiful campus of the University of Cambridge in England, brought together leaders from industry and academia to discuss the latest on foodborne illness surveillance and food fraud. I traveled to the event to serve as one of only three speakers representing the United States. The congress chair, Dr. Arun Bhunia from Purdue University, stressed the event’s unofficial theme of change as he urged that continued advancements in science be put to use earlier in the overall food production lifecycle. While retail surveillance is too reactive and the active screening and testing in post-harvest facilities has not shown to reduce outbreaks and recalls, advancement in pre-harvest surveillance technology is needed to proactively mitigate the risks from pathogens and toxins. Michele Suman, from Barilla Research Labs in Italy, continued with the notion of change, sharing how changes in technologies and in management approaches have impacted the reduction of mycotoxins for his company. One such change in mitigation of mycotoxins is in physical and chemical processing. Here, though they start with commodities that are already below limits, a better understanding of the process impacts and how they may actually increase mycotoxin levels has resulted in the company taking steps to further reduce levels so as not to later exceed them. Another area of change discussed by presenters was climate change. Dr. Rudolf Krska, from Vienna, Austria, showed how studies of Aflatoxin B1 in maize produced data that hint at changes in temperatures forcing plant pathogens and pests to move locations at about 1.5 to 3 miles per year from the equator to the poles. Dr. John O’Brien, deputy head of the Nestlé Research Center in Switzerland, echoed the concerns over climate change as part of the changing reality framing food safety for consumers. O’Brien reminded the audience, however, that while science cannot undo the effects of climate change, it can be used to reduce the impact on food. I delivered a presentation which focused on a different kind of climate change: political change. This election season has been notable for candidates’ lack of even mentioning food safety, or even implementation of the Food Safety Modernization Act this month. Experts agree that the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) will most likely have a negative overall impact on food safety and on environmental policies. Another point concerning recent political topics is that food safety over larger geographical regions will most likely suffer from building barriers (or “walls”), as well as from countries exiting unions. Food fraud dominated the discussion of change on day two. Grant Cropper, a compliance training manager in the U.K., stated that with the prevalence of “Big Data,” supply chain risk and resilience processes need to see advancements in terms of integrity and assurance of food supply for fraudulent food. Allergens and labeling serve as major driving factors as incidents throughout Europe have shown significant deficiencies in leadership and intelligence gathering. And failure to place more emphasis on food safety assurance now will inevitably lead to another food fraud or safety incident like the 2013 horsemeat scandal. Cropper shared that a recent three-year survey of U.K. food companies revealed 63 percent submitted inadequate HACCP plans and procedures, while 74 percent of product recall and crisis management documents needed improvement. As a result, food crimes are causing changes in insurance for food companies. Cropper’s suggestions to resolve these deficiencies include more needed changes: greater education and greater government support to small and medium companies. Food crime is not new and has long existed; however, the severe dishonesty behind food crimes is viewed as a recent trend. Today food is being seen by criminals as a means of making money. The horsemeat incident awoke a need for national leadership on food crime. Proactivity is seen as having been absent at the time of that scandal. Andy Morling, head of the U.K.’s new National Food Crime Unit, has the job of looking for it before it finds consumers again. Morling discussed how his job is not about making new laws or new punishments as much as ensuring that the government can better use existing laws pertaining to fraud. The certainty of a punishment for food criminals is a more important tool than the severity of the punishment. His unit has a three-pronged mission: to pursue (detection), to protect the food industry, and to prevent people from becoming involved in food crime. John Coady, chief audit and investigations manager for the Food Safety Authority of Ireland, emphasized the current economic pressures behind food fraud by sharing how his agency found companies using suppliers known to be behind the horsemeat scandal or similar incidents. One recent change is that consumers are no longer the only ones to suffer from consequences. Companies desiring to buy at lower and lower prices “for the purpose of vast profits” are now facing significant consequences. This is a shift in the judicial priority on such cases. Coady pointed to the words of one judge presiding over a trial on food in which he stated that profits from food fraud are funding organized crime. Two interesting Q&A takeaways include the merging of food fraud and food defense as a national effort, as well as the role of technology in communication. Attendees and presenters agree that the overlapping concerns of food fraud and defense are many and that, through combining, emphasis and support on one end will only improve the other. O’Brien reminded us of the words of George Bernard Shaw: “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” While new communication technologies allow for better collection of data, they certainly open opportunities for greater communication regarding food for consumers. My concern over this notion is the shortsightedness with the sole use of printed URLs or QR Codes for informing U.S. consumers (as opposed to actually printing consumer information.) This can be seen with the Roberts-Stabenow Compromise Bill, passed by both houses of Congress and signed into law by President Obama back in July, to create a mandatory national labeling standard for GMO foods. What good is a label if a large percentage of consumers cannot read or access the information due to our digital divide? Further, will this use of URLs or QR Codes set a precedent that allows companies to replace safe handling instructions or allergen warnings with such limited-access technologies? (Editor’s note: Food Safety News was a media partner of this year’s Food Safety and Analysis Congress.)

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Praise for an Unlikely ‘Whistleblower’

Darin Detwiler — Fri, 25 Sep 2015 05:02:57 +0000

Kenneth Kendrick, missing Monday from the federal courthouse in Albany, GA, did not hear the praise that came from a witness during a pivotal day in the world of food safety. Kendrick is a former assistant plant manager of the Plainview, Texas, peanut processing facility once owned by the now-defunct Peanut Corporation of America (PCA). On Sept. 21, 2015, his past bosses and supervisors — Stewart Parnell, former owner of PCA, Michael Parnell, former peanut broker, and Mary Wilkerson, former quality assurance manager — sat for sentencing in the same courthouse in which their federal trial was conducted a year earlier. At the heart of this trial and sentencing sits the 2008-09 Salmonella outbreak, considered one of the most significant in U.S. history. The CDC report on this multistate outbreak identifies 714 clinically confirmed illnesses across 46 states and nine deaths. Later estimates from the CDC place the number of potential victims not reporting an illness at more than 22,000. Their attempts to hide evidence and obstruct justice delayed investigators from finding the true source of the contamination and bringing an end to the outbreak sooner.

Kenneth Kendrick

Unbeknownst to investigators, PCA also had a peanut processing plant in Plainview, Texas, where Kendrick worked for several months in 2006. Back then, Kendrick observed numerous problems in the Texas plant, including rat infestations, bird nests, and a roof leak — all of which triggered his concern for feces in the product. According to Kendrick, “particularly with water leaking off a roof, bird feces can wash in and drip onto the peanuts.” After only a few months on the job, Kendrick chose to leave his position with PCA because, as he stated, “I knew it was a train wreck and something unethical and bad was about to happen.” “When I was working there, [PCA had] nothing that resembled a quality assurance program,” Kendrick said. “I came from a lab testing background in the meat industry. I thought there would be regular testing, like in the meat industry… .” Years later, when Kendrick learned that the widespread Salmonella outbreak in 2008-09 had been traced back to PCA’s Georgia plant, he spent “hundreds of hours” trying to contact the media and federal food or health agencies to alert them to the numerous violations he witnessed in PCA’s plant in Plainview. Attempt after attempt failed to result in a reply from anyone. Kendrick sent anonymous emails and letters to the Texas Department of Health and to companies that purchased products from his plant, but he never received a response from them. The only response he received was from the Chicago office of STOP Foodborne Illness, the leading national non-profit organization dedicated to the prevention of illness and death from foodborne pathogens. STOP convinced FDA officials to meet with Kendrick in January 2009. The staff at STOP Foodborne Illness also connected Kendrick with Gardiner Harris, a reporter at The New York Times. Harris’ article, “After Tests, Peanut Plant in Texas Is Closed,” appeared in the Feb. 11, 2009, Health and Policy section of the paper. After that article appeared, STOP Foodborne Illness connected Kendrick with a producer from ABC’s “Good Morning America” show.

The now-closed Peanut Corporation of America facility in Plainview, TX.

During a Feb. 16, 2009, exclusive interview with the show, Kendrick discussed how his granddaughter became ill with Salmonella-like symptoms for three weeks in December, a time when she only wanted to eat peanut butter crackers. “So I kept giving her the crackers and she kept getting sicker,” Kendrick said. “I’ve had a lot of sleepless nights over that, a lot of crying over that issue.” He then went on to describe in shocking detail the conditions he observed at the PCA plant in Texas. After his interviews, investigators shifted their focus to the plant where Kendrick once worked. Texas officials had no idea that the Plainview facility even existed. Stewart Parnell had not registered his Texas peanut facility as a food processing plant with the state. As a result of Kendrick’s whistleblowing, federal authorities and the Texas Department of Health investigated the Plainview plant as another source of the outbreak. His information helped prove that peanut products were being shipped between PCA facilities in different states — contrary to what Parnell had told the public and investigators throughout the outbreak. In 2013, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted Parnell, his brother, and three other executives involved in the attempts to conceal problems at PCA on charges of fraud, wire fraud, obstruction of justice, and more than 70 other charges. At the end of their 2014 trial, a 12-member jury found Stewart Parnell guilty on 67 federal felony counts, Michael Parnell guilty on 30 counts, and Wilkerson guilty on one of two counts of obstruction of justice. The 2015 sentencing of the five convicted food industry executives included the testimonies of victims and families affected by PCA and the outbreak of Salmonella tied to the company. Jeff Almer, who lost his mother during the outbreak, named each guilty executive and had a word or two for them. He asked Wilkerson about her definition of quality assurance. He even stared at Stewart Parnell and said, “You killed my mom.” Before ending his testimony, Almer stated before the court his appreciation for the efforts of Kenneth Kendrick in helping to make sure that the investigation, as well as the subsequent trial and sentencing, became possible. On Monday, Sept. 21, 2015, the judge handed Stewart Parnell a sentence of 28 years in prison, Michael Parnell 20 years, and Mary Wilkerson 5 years. Former PCA managers Daniel Kilgore and Samuel Lightsey, who pleaded guilty under agreements with federal prosecutors, are scheduled to receive their sentences on Oct. 1, 2015.

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Bearing Witness to Justice at the PCA Sentencing

Darin Detwiler — Wed, 23 Sep 2015 05:02:26 +0000

Audiences at my lectures are often surprised that, after the death of my 16-month-old son, Riley, during the 1993 Jack in the Box E. coli outbreak, no state or federal agency filed criminal charges against anyone involved in that easily-preventable tragedy. For the past 22 years since Riley’s death, I viewed the American justice system as being less than what I had learned in school and not reflecting the U.S. Constitution that I swore to uphold and defend while serving in the Navy. On Monday, Sept. 21, 2015, I saw for myself when Justitia finally opened her eyes to focus on and punish food executives whose wanton actions sickened and killed unsuspecting consumers. Sitting in the gallery of the federal courthouse in Albany, Georgia, I bore witness to the sentencing of three Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) executives convicted for their roles of knowingly selling Salmonella Typhimurium-tainted peanuts to food processing manufacturers, which then made their deadly way to consumers in 46 states during 2008 and 2009. After calling the court to order, U.S. District Judge W. Louis Sands said that victims and family members of victims were present in the courtroom to be heard before sentencing. While this sentencing hearing was specifically for Stewart Parnell (former CEO of PCA), Michael Parnell (brother of Stewart and former broker for PCA), and Mary Wilkerson (former QA manager for PCA), the judge also ordered that Daniel Kilgore and Samuel Lightsey (both former plant managers for PCA) be present. Kilgore and Lightsey, also convicted for their roles in the Salmonella Typhimurium outbreak, will be sentenced next week. Judge Sands wanted them to also hear the testimony of the victims and their families.

The former PCA plant in Blakely, GA.

The lead prosecutor introduced each victim’s testimony. Gabrielle Meunier told the court that she did not want her son present to hear the tragic details of his 2008 illness. “My 7-year-old son told me that he was in so much pain that he wanted to die,” she said. Randy Napier, whose mother died as a result of eating tainted peanuts during the outbreak, shared with the court that his mother “taught us traits of love, respect, and forgiveness … traits that are being tested today.” Jeff Almer, who attended most of the trial hearings last summer, stared at and talked directly to each of the defendants. In a haunting tone, he said, “Stewart Parnell, you killed my mom.” Peter Hurley, whose son, Jacob, was sickened by PCA peanuts, flew in from Portland, Oregon, to say, “Stewart Parnell, you gave some people death sentences. Luckily, you are not being sentenced to death.” Ernest Clark had great difficulty controlling his emotions as he described the impact of the outbreak on his family. He told the court, “My grandmother suffered the maximum penalty anyone can pay for eating a food she loved.” The last to speak at the sentencing hearing was Al Shelander. In a solemn voice, he talked of how his life and lives of his children were forever changed by the death of wife and mother Betty. “One day, the center of our family was gone,” he said. After hearing testimony from those impacted by the Salmonella outbreak, the court took statements from friends and family members of the convicted executives and comments from the prosecution and defense teams. After a recess during the afternoon, the court reconvened and the judge began to impose sentences on each of the three defendants. Sands took his time remembering and discussing the victims and the courtroom testimony. “We place faith that no one would intentionally ship products to market that are contaminated,” the judge said. He continued, “Striking and strong testimony was heard today. Consumers are at the mercy of food producers for the safety of the products. These acts [of the convicted PCA executives] were driven by profit and the protection of profit … thus greed.” Sands told Stewart Parnell that while this case “does not represent [his] entire life, the outcome affects a lot of people.” He concluded that Stewart Parnell had clear “knowledge that there was Salmonella in the peanuts and that it was being shipped out of [his] plant.” He noted that Parnell had “taken risks for years,” that they were “eventually discovered and traced back” to his corporation, and that, unfortunately, “thousands of people suffered and nine died” from Parnell’s knowing disregard for public health and safety.

U.S. District Court Judge W. Louis Sands

For Stewart Parnell’s role, and after guilty verdicts on more than 60 criminal charges, Sands sentenced Parnell to a term of 336 months — 28 years in prison. When Michael Parnell stood before the bench, the judge made similar statements regarding how the case before the court reflected on only a small part of his life. Sands then sentenced Michael Parnell, following his conviction on more than 30 criminal charges, to a term of 240 months — 20 years in prison. Finally, the judge addressed defendant Mary Wilkerson, the former QA manager at PCA. “You were not a top executive in PCA, and your attorney painted a picture of you as a minor player in this case. You were aware of what was going on and played a role in concealing the problem. That was not actually a minor role in this case,” he concluded. Sands acknowledged the testimony of Wilkerson’s sister and husband regarding her spouse and two sons. “To have a strong family and still be able to care for them is a lot better than the reality for some of those in this courtroom,” he said. The judge imposed sentence on Mary Wilkerson, after her conviction on one count of obstruction of justice, to the maximum possible term of 60 months — 5 years in prison. After another brief recess (it was now past 6 p.m.), the prosecution team asked the court to find that the Parnell brothers were flight risks and to deny them bail while they appeal their convictions. The prosecutors did not ask the same for Wilkerson. The defense attorneys then made a few statements regarding their clients and, with that, the judge took a brief recess. Sands then discussed and dismissed defense team allegations of prosecutorial misconduct and a less-than-unbiased jury. He also addressed defense objections to the victims’ testimony, citing their constitutional rights. The judge then announced that the character witnesses and families of the two Parnell brothers hurt their argument that the two men would not be a flight risk by talking about Stewart Parnell’s hobby of being a licensed pilot and flying all over the country, their family resources, and their many connections around the world. He ordered that the two be taken into custody of the U.S. Marshals while allowing bail for Wilkerson (stating that she did not pose the same flight risk without the same access to resources) until the Bureau of Prisons directs her to appear at a specified time and place to begin her sentence. The PCA case, according to Sands, was not about the “condemnation of peanuts or the peanut industry, but of a few individuals.” In my opinion, the outcome of the sentencing will send strong messages. Corporate boardrooms across America — those in the food industry and beyond — will be talking about the legal implications of this case for many years to come. For the first time, executives and others involved in allowing tainted food to enter the food chain will be facing potential personal criminal liability. That should be a real wake-up call. The victims and their families played a key role in this trial at sentencing. For them, and for the thousands of others across this country impacted by preventable foodborne illnesses, the outcome should serve as some element of closure and vindication. Finally, this trial and the sentences should send a strong message of hope to American families, hope now that the justice system has tackled this in a meaningful and aggressive way. Some may call the lengths of these sentences too short, given the deaths and illnesses caused by the actions of these defendants. That’s best left to judges and juries. If the executives at Jack in the Box had been prosecuted two decades ago, imagine the impact on the food industry that likely would have resulted and how many illnesses and deaths could have been prevented. As I stated before legislators in 1993, “No product, no industry, no job is more important than a life — particularly a child’s life.”

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PCA Does Not Reflect All in the Food Industry

Darin Detwiler — Fri, 18 Sep 2015 05:02:36 +0000

Michael Parnell’s defense attorney is painting his client as a “little guy” who “lost it all.” I would dare Parnell and his defense team, and the other convicted former Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) executives, to stand before the families of the nine people who died as a result of their actions and try to convince them that he is the one who “lost it all.” Michael Parnell’s defense attorney is also painting his client as a “family man” who has been married for 31 years and has two sons, including one who has special needs. While I am aware of the stress that this criminal trial and sentencing must place on his family, I wonder: Would Michael’s brother, former PCA CEO Stewart Parnell, have served his “Clean em’ all up and ship them” peanut products to his own family? Thousands of parents across this nation cannot ignore the empty seat at their family table. Foodborne illnesses are regarded as infectious diseases which are, by and large, preventable. CDC estimates of the millions of foodborne illnesses and thousands of deaths in this country each year are staggering. Many families of the victims from the 2008-2009 Salmonella outbreak tied to PCA have spent the past few years testifying before legislators for stronger food safety policies and working to prevent such events from ever happening to other families. Since his conviction, Stewart Parnell has also spent many long hours working – on his tennis swing at a country club in Virginia. Unlike Stewart Parnell and PCA, the vast majority of companies in the food industry strive to make food safety a priority each and every day. I work with some companies that invest in proactive measures to train employees and even indoctrinate their suppliers and distributors around their mission of food safety.

But just as bacteria are always present in the foods we eat, outbreaks do happen. After many such outbreaks, we can find example after example of corporations and executives who see the event as a wakeup call and react in ways to prevent such events from ever happening again.

One such example can be seen in California where, as a result of the 2006 E. coli outbreak tied to spinach which sickened more than 200 people in 26 states and killed three, the leafy green produce industry took responsibility for the event, invested in new training and protocols, and worked together in alliances to strengthen the level of safety of their products to ensure that it never happens again.

In 2007, following the tragic E. coli outbreak, California farmers made an unprecedented commitment to protect public health through the creation of the California Leafy Green Products Handler Marketing Agreement (LGMA). The program’s goal is to assure safety and confidence in California-grown lettuce, spinach and other leafy greens. Since then, they have partnered with a sister program in Arizona to include approximately 90 percent of the leafy greens grown in the U.S.

LGMA collaborated with STOP Foodborne Illness, a non-profit health organization dedicated to the prevention of foodborne illness, to produce a video training tool called “The WHY behind Food Safety” as part of their training program. U.S. Food and Drug Administration Deputy Commissioner Michael Taylor called this new video project a great example of the “spirit of partnership which characterizes today’s food safety landscape.”

Aimed at farm workers, this industry video features two young women who have been sickened in past foodborne illness outbreaks. The victims explain, in vivid detail, about their illnesses to illustrate why it is so important for workers on leafy green farms to follow proper food safety practices. The video stresses not only what farms should be doing, but why.

An important lesson out of this PCA outbreak and criminal trial is that our food industry includes only a very small percentage of companies whose low level of ethics and poor track record of food safety is as egregious as this one. Perhaps the upcoming sentencing will serve as a warning to them.

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Building an ‘Integrated Food Safety System’ Will Take All of Us

Darin Detwiler — Fri, 29 May 2015 05:02:50 +0000

Mike Taylor, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Deputy Commissioner for Foods, stated in his address before the 2015 Food Safety Summit that, “If we were starting from scratch, [America’s food safety system] would look different.” Under Taylor’s leadership, FDA’s implementation of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) envisions an “integrated food safety system” to achieve the ultimate goal of reducing the “risk of illness attributed to food from facilities subject to preventive controls rule under the act.” FSMA is intended to ensure that American consumers are safe by shifting FDA’s focus from responding to problems to preventing them. The May 25, 2015, report from the Boston Globe (“Widespread violations found at Boston’s food spots” by Matt Rocheleau) exposes how important a preventive approach will be based on the large number of critical violations seen in Boston-area restaurants in 2014. The report also begs the question, “What about the role(s) of state, county, and city food inspectors?” Whereas FSMA specifically references almost all of the other 14 relevant federal cabinet-level food safety agencies such as the USDA, the Commerce Department, the Departments of Homeland Security and Health and Human Services, and relevant sub-agencies such as CDC, the Act places FDA in a position where the agency must employ an integrated approach that also depends on state, university, tribal, and territorial resources. FSMA extensively mentions state health and agriculture departments, requiring FDA to coordinate with or consult these agencies on actions it is to take to implement the law, use them as part of its food safety activities, or assist them in upgrading services they perform. In general, FSMA respects federal and state responsibilities but seeks to engage synergies that exist between state and federal entities in an integrated way. While the roles of other government agencies are not specifically mentioned or identified, FDA has stated that an integrated food safety system will be built for addressing FSMA requirements. The agency has identified and even posted on its webpage that the Partnership for Food Protection (PFP) is the group that will help to build an integrated food safety system. According to FDA, “The Partnership for Food Protection (PFP) is a group of dedicated professionals from Federal, State, and Local governments (partner agencies) with roles in protecting the food supply and public health. PFP is the structure used to meld and coordinate representatives with expertise in food, feed, epidemiology, laboratory, animal health, environment, and public health to develop and implement an Integrated Food Safety System (IFSS).” One problem with any integration is that the preventive efforts of every agency must be sustainable. Some states debate FSMA’s reliance on state-level inspections because of resource limits — perhaps one of the biggest challenges for an integrated food safety system. During FDA’s April 2015 public meeting on FSMA implementation, many top FDA executives stressed that the challenges for implementation included not only the issue of Congress funding the entire needed budget for FSMA implementation, but also the problems inherent in training, communicating, collaborating, and sharing data with a large number of state and federal agencies. States will need funding to bring their programs up to speed on federal standards and to maintain the level of qualified staff. I imagine that we will soon see the states place a greater emphasis on grants or contract funding as being essential to overcome a lack of resources at the state level. The 1993 E. coli outbreak served as the “9/11 for the food industry” as it woke up consumers and policymakers to the problems with foodborne pathogens. The problems have spread far from being solely associated with meat. Today, spinach, peanuts, and even ice cream have captured the news for sickening and killing consumers. Even CDC stated recently that some of these foods were never on its radar as foods of concern for pathogens. Thus, the implications for restaurants and for county health inspectors should be that problems with safe food could happen anywhere and at any time. In the May 28, 2015 Food Safety News article, “Health Code Violations in Boston Not Unusual, Not Acceptable,” Roy Costa, founder and owner of the consulting firm Environ Health Associates, stated that, “Issues persist because many restaurants think they’re fine as long as the health department doesn’t shut them down.” Perhaps a fundamental shift in the food safety culture seen in restaurants is that they, too, play a role in an Integrated Food Safety System, that they should not need to wait until a regulator or a member of the Partnership for Food Protection tells them to do something, and that they should never assume that what they are doing is fine simply because the restaurant has not been shut down. The March 26, 2015, Food Safety News article, “LA TV Station Reports Health Department’s Failure to Announce Salmonella Outbreak,” exposed how some county health departments “do not typically alert the public when they are in the midst of an investigation.” Unfortunately, Brent’s Deli in Westlake Village, CA, stayed open and customers knew of no health concerns even though the Ventura County Health Department noted that serious violations at that restaurant date back to 2007. I talk with victims or their families who have seen just how devastating foodborne illnesses can be. They often tell me that they never thought that something like this could happen in America, let alone to them. Their worst fears came about due to violations along the way from the farm to fork. ALL of us, including restaurants and local governments, play a role in making sure that the family meal ordered at a restaurant or served at home does not come with a side of fear or regret.