Ottawa wanted U.S. to accept more lenient meat inspection regime

[CHIMO]

Source: Globe and Mail

OTTAWA — The Canadian government strongly opposed tougher U.S. rules to prevent listeria and lobbied the United States to accept Canada's more lenient standards, internal documents reveal.

Briefing notes prepared by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency for an April 7, 2006, meeting with the board of directors of the Canadian Meat Council outline how both industry and the Canadian government were frustrated with the increased precautions the United States was demanding.

Specifically, Canada opposed daily inspection visits and the testing of finished products for Listeria monocytogenes.

However, it does not appear those higher U.S. standards were enough to prevent the current outbreak.



Read more: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080829.wmeatcfia29/BNStory/National/home

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B.C. death raises listeriosis outbreak toll to 9

The nationwide outbreak of listeriosis is being blamed for a ninth death, public health officials said Friday afternoon.

The death occurred in British Columbia and is the first fatality outside of Ontario since news of the outbreak emerged nearly two weeks ago.

Six other people — four in Ontario, one in Saskatchewan and one in B.C. — who died had the outbreak strain of listeria, but health officials are still investigating to determine whether the food-borne bacteria caused or contributed to their deaths.

In total, 29 cases of listeriosis have been tied to the outbreak and tainted meat from a Toronto plant run by Maple Leaf Foods. A further 35 cases of the infection are being examined to find out whether they, too, were spawned by the outbreak.

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/08/29/listeria-fri.html

Can't get away from these free marketers.

[Crowman1979]

1. I guess some of you are now scrapping your move to Canada plans.

Because all you are doing is moving from one neocon government, to the next.

[ronnie624]

5. The current outbreak of fascism is a global phenomenon.

It's a filthy dross that resides in both of the official U.S. political parties as well.

[Oregone]

6. I cashed in...

And no...not seeing the fascism here.

Every place has problems. But not every place is a perpetual problem in itself.

[TrogL]

9. We're having an election - that could change

Harper decided to scrap his own party's idea of fixed election dates and is calling one early.

[endless october]

2. i thought

i thought meat was irradiated. the listeria would be killed very quickly if it were.

there is a lot of urban legend-type hysteria on the net about food irradiation, but it's pretty safe and is used in Europe quite often.

it's a whole lot safer than consuming live listeria monocytogenes or e. coli 0157:h7.

[CHIMO]

3. Obviously

This meat packer wasn't doing that.

Food safety agency allowing producers to police themselves: ex-inspector
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/08/27/food-safety.html

[Oregone]

7. From the CBC report I watched last night...

Irradiation is correlated with a decline in nutritional/vitamin content and is ineffective (at low, safe levels) to kill all the listeria. I believe I heard it is not used on this type of meat here.

Remember though, this only happened in one plant. They cleaned the area they internally tested as positive, but they are not required to actually test the products. After the outbreak, the entire plant was cleaned. As a whole, Im not seeing listeria popping up everywhere. Clearly their procedures didn't work this one time, and Id expect it to be revised very quickly.

Also remember, listeria is in a ton of food everywhere. The fact of the matter is most people are completely safe from consuming it, albeit the young, old and pregnant. When my wife was pregnant, we stayed far from any lunch/deli meats with good reason (while we were living in the US). It was quite well-documented that we should (and such documentation exists in the US for a reason).

[endless october]

8. actually, listeria is killed by irradiation

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/120006353/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0

listeria is as sensitive as salmonella.

and cooking the food also reduces nutrient content.

but to be fair, i would be happy if they offered both irradiated and non-irradiated food. that way i could buy the irradiated food and others could buy something else. i would just like to have that choice, since food poisoning scares me.

[daleo]

10. Irradiation would just lower sanitary standards further

Food companies would just use irradiation as an excuse to lower overall standards of hygiene throughout their plants even more than they are now, and to reduce inspection schedules. The net result would be no increase in safety.

[endless october]

11. that's a common argument

but one that i disagree with. any increase in irradiation treatments would have to be accompanied with increased inspections to completely deflate this argument, and once we have real leadership in Washington, that will be the case.

i had a whole section on food irradiation in applied micro, so i am pretty sold on it. food poisoning makes 76 million sick and kills over 5,000 a year.

irradiation could drastically reduce these numbers.

http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=88576

[daleo]

14. It's how industry does things, when they get a chance

It would be nice if new leadership could make up the difference. I am rather cynical about it, though.

You might think of this as another example of risk compensation, or risk homeostasis. That is the tendency of people to adjust their behavior to a certain perceived risk level. For example, with anti-lock brakes people tend to tail-gate more (attempting to save on commuting time), thus negating the effect of the safety technology. There is persuasive evidence that this is a real effect.

In this case, companies and the government would be motivated to cut costs in other safety areas, as the irradiation technology would allow them some room to do so, with the same level of health risk being maintained.

http://psyc.queensu.ca/target/index.html#contents

[endless october]

15. i've read how it works in Europe

... so i'm optimistic that the upcoming Obama administration will keep a sharp eye out on this issue.

i can hope, right?

;)

[daleo]

16. Fair enough

Hope is good.

[Oregone]

13. Im just relaying what the CBC report said

It did cite irradiation killed listeria, BUT noted, it is not effective for killing it ALL completely. Levels proven to kill all bacteria were cited as being dangerous levels which drastically reduced nutritional content and may be unsafe for consumption. Even in the US, they do not use those levels. That is why pregnant people are advised by health authorities in the US to stay away from deli meats. You never completely eliminate it at those approved levels, they claim.

[Pete2069]

4. Ottawa wanted U.S. to accept lenient meat inspection

Why not , they really have a problems with the mad cow
disease.  Bush isn't worried about people catching the Mad Cow
disease, after all he will be out of  office Because some
times it take 10 to 20 years for it to activate. 
Bush and the republicans will simply blame Clinton for it
anyway.
 
Remember the statement that use to be said when someone did
something  wrong.....They  would say mikey did it.
 
Well the republicans have replaced the name Mikey with
"Clinton"...

Soooo.. for the last 16 years all of Bush and his
administrations criminal crimes and corruption have been
blamed on Clinton...

[endless october]

12. this cannot be allowed