MORE ON FOOD SAFETY

I have been trying to find a history of FDA budgets and in the meantime, I've found some sources that point the finger at inadequate funding. In Business Week ("Where's the Food Safety Net?" 6/12/08), reporter John Carey comes up with these problems:

- a chronic lack of money and manpower
- since 2004 the agency has lost nearly a third of its food safety and field staffers, and many more are expected to retire soon.
- Critical equipment also is in short supply.
- when the agency proposed new safety regulations on produce last year, the Bush Administration nixed the request.

An organization called Strengthen the FDA provides a sumnmary of the FDA's Science Advisory Board Report from 12/3/2007 and here are two of the findings:

4) FDA resources have not kept pace with its responsibilities. The agency’s core programs have lost a thousand people in the past decade; FDA’s food headquarters staff has lost 20% of its scientists in just the past three years. Similarly, FDA has lost several hundred inspectors since 2003, leaving the agency incapable of inspecting domestic manufacturers and meaning that few of the nation’s ports have FDA inspectors.

6) FDA cannot ensure the safety of our food supply. The report’s authors saw a food safety system in which basic inspection and enforcement functions have been severely eroded, along with the agency’s ability to respond rapidly to foodborne disease outbreaks. The FDA did 35,000 domestic food inspections in 1973, but will do only 8000 this year.