Safe Food_ Bacteria, Biotechnology, and Bioterrorism - Marion Nestle [172]
2008: Peppers, not Tomatoes (Salmonella). This outbreak demonstrated how entire industries can be damaged in the search for a source of foodborne illness. On May 22, 2008, the New Mexico Health Department notified the CDC that several people had been infected with Salmonella Saintpaul. Some cases clustered in the Navajo Nation and investigations by the Indian Health Service suggested tomatoes as the likely source. The FDA warned residents of New Mexico and Texas not to eat local raw tomatoes and soon expanded the warning nationally. Restaurant chains stopped serving tomatoes, consumers stopped buying them, and tomato growers lost $200 million in sales.36
To verify the source, the CDC conducted seven epidemiologic and environmental investigations, none easy to interpret. Salsa and guacamole were mentioned frequently by people who became ill; these foods contained tomatoes and either raw jalapeño or Serrano peppers. CDC investigators found the outbreak strain in peppers from Mexico. But they continued to consider tomatoes as a possible source until the end of June and did not lift the tomato warning until July 17. By that time, the domestic tomato industry had been virtually destroyed. Also destroyed was a good deal of public confidence in the safety of fresh produce and in government oversight.37
Federal officials explained their error: “Local, state, tribal, and federal response capacity often is strained during large and complex outbreaks. . . . This can cause delays.”38 Perhaps, but an analysis of the events by the Pew Charitable Trusts came to tougher conclusions. It questioned why safety officials from two federal and three state agencies insisted that tomatoes were the vector and spoke publicly “with significant variations in facts and messages.” It said officials should have learned from previous recalls and charged that despite repeated calls for action, “the establishment of mandatory, enforceable safety standards for the growing, harvesting, processing, and distribution of fresh fruits and vegetables has not happened.”39
2009: Peanut Butter (Salmonella). Late in 2008, the CDC became aware of clusters of illness caused by Salmonella Typhimurium in young and old people in schools or long-term care facilities. In interviews, 86 percent said they had eaten chicken and 77 percent said they had eaten peanut butter. Because frequencies in the general population are 85 percent for eating chicken and 59 percent for eating peanut butter, peanut butter seemed the more likely source. In January 2009, King Nut Companies, a distributor of peanut butter manufactured by the Peanut Corporation of America (PCA), recalled five-pound tubs of the PCA product.40
Because peanuts destined for peanut butter are roasted, the contamination must have occurred after processing. The plant shipped two kinds of peanut butter: bulk intended for institutions, and ingredients intended for food processors. Samples of both were found to contain the outbreak strain. Eventually, companies recalled nearly four thousand food products containing peanut butter, among them crackers, frozen chicken, emergency disaster rations, and pet foods—so many that the FDA produced an online “widget” to keep track of them.
The politics of this particular incident were especially telling. Investigations revealed that the PCA plant knowingly shipped peanut butter contaminated with Salmonella. When tests came back positive, PCA retested