Over the past two weeks, XL Foods, Inc. – a Canadian firm – has expanded its recall thirteen times to now include all beef products produced at XL Plant #38 during the high event period of = Aug 24, 27, 28, 29 and Sept 5 – a total in excess of one million pounds of recalled products.  That means that any beef destined to become ground beef, plus all steaks, roasts and other cuts destined for retail sale, are potentially contaminated with the deadly E. coli O157:H7 and need to be returned or discarded.

These products – which have been distributed in the United States – have been associated with nine illnesses in Canada.  Four of these illnesses have been linked to consuming contaminated steaks.

Recalls have happened before – so, what makes this one different?

First and foremost, the Canadian XL Beef recall includes beef steaks and roasts that have been “mechanically tenderized.”  Most consumers are aware that ground beef carries a higher risk for contamination and know that undercooking ground beef can potentially lead to a foodborne illness.  However, most consumers are not aware that many raw steaks and roasts have been mechanically tenderized prior to sale.  In fact, most consumers do not even know what that process involves.

Mechanical tenderization is generally done in a processing plant and uses needles or blades, attached to a rotating machine, to tenderize meat and poultry products.   Sometimes, the product is also “enhanced” with water or a marinade.  After the process is completed, the needle holes or blade cuts disappear and the product appears as if it had never been treated.  Multiple studies – including ones conducted by USDA – have shown that this process can transfer or “translocate” foodborne pathogens to the inside of the meat where it is harder to kill.  As a result, mechanically tenderized meat needs to be treated like ground beef and must be cooked to a higher temperature.  Unfortunately, USDA does not require this type of product to be labeled so the consumer purchasing the product has no way to identify which cutlets, chops, steaks or roasts have been mechanically tenderized and which ones are “intact.”

USDA estimates that about 18% of all beef steaks and roasts sold in this country are mechanically tenderized, yet without a label, there is no way for a consumer to determine whether or not a particular product has been treated.  Consumer groups, recognizing the important food safety issue involved, have been pushing for the past three years to get USDA to label mechanically tenderized meat products.  In mid-September, right before the Canadian XL Beef recall was announced, USDA Secretary of Agriculture Vilsack approved the proposed labeling rule and sent it to the White House for further review and approval.  Meanwhile, Americans are at risk of being sickened with an E. coli O157:H7 infection due to mechanically tenderized beef products associated with the Canadian XL recall.

All consumers should check USDA’s public health alert and then click on the “retail distribution list” to determine if a particular retail outlet in a particular state had Canadian XL Beef for sale.  Return or discard any product associated with this recall.

Consumers can also write to the Office of Management and Budget and tell OMB and the President that USDA’s label proposal for mechanically tenderized meat must be approved immediately.  Consumers have the right to know if their meat and poultry products have been treated with mechanical tenderization prior to sale.

Patricia Buck is Director of Outreach and Education at the Center for Foodborne Illness Research & Prevention http://www.foodborneillness.org.

Center for Foodborne Illness Research and Prevention is a member of the Make Our Food Safe (MOFS) coalition.  We joined MOFS because it reflects the collective wisdom of consumer, advocacy, public health and victims of foodborne illness groups, and as such, it has earned the respect of policy-makers as they’ve worked to develop reasonable reform of FDA and its food oversight responsibilities.

The question, of course, has been and continues to be “What do we need to improve food safety?” 

First, we need the agency, the Food and Drug Administration  (FDA), charged with oversight of 80 percent of the food in this country, to have the resources and authorities necessary to complete its tasks, but right now, FDA is saddled with a 1938 law that no longer can easily respond to America’s and the world’s food production systems.

So what’s the problem–enactment of this type of legislation should be easy! Well, not really, because everybody has their own ideas and nobody wants the changes to affect them.  Meanwhile, the list of food recalls, sicknesses, health/financial impacts and deaths continues to grow.  Staying with the status quo is really not an option. 

As a food safety advocate who has watched Congress trying to build food safety legislation over the past nine years, S. 510 and H.R. 2749 are truly the result of bi-partisan work.  Both bills have been sponsored and supported by leading Democrats and Republicans because most of our Congressional members realize the importance of this issue.  Everybody eats, so everybody carries a risk for getting sick.

At the beginning of the 111th Congress, the food safety advocates–both consumer and industry–came together and basically said, “Let’s do something  to stem the increasing number of food recalls and foodborne illnesses–let’s build a sturdy bill that simply addresses the most important points and get everyone to take that first step forward.”  The House quickly passed its version of FDA food safety reform in July, 2009; the Senate moved its version out of committee in November 2009.  Everything looked to be on track for an easy passage, but then S. 510 stalled.

Stalling by itself is not a bad thing–it gives everyone a chance to review their position and for compromises to be worked out.  And that is what happened to S. 510.  It got modified–the bill being brought to the floor tomorrow continues to be the result of collaborated work.  It gives FDA a specific statutory mandate to prevent foodborne illness by:

·         Requiring all food producing facilities to develop a food safety plan;

·         Establishing a frequency of inspection for FDA food;

·         Holding imported food to the same standards as food produced domestically;

·         Setting standards for fresh fruits and vegetables that pose high risk for contamination;

·         Improving coordination between federal, state and local food safety governmental offices;

·         Developing traceability requirements so we have a better idea where the food is sold/produced;

·         Providing FDA, for the first time, with mandatory recall authority.

Food safety impacts all of us.  We absolutely must begin the task of reforming our outdated food safety systems.  I found this out as I stood next to the bed of my dying grandson, Kevin Kowalcyk, and since then I have re-organized my life to help raise awareness about the food challenges of the 21st century.

S. 510 is a basic blueprint for reform.  After its passage, much more work will need to be done to implement it successfully, and I, along with other S. 510 supporters, will be there– watching and suggesting solutions–so that improvement in food safety becomes a reality.

Last Thursday was Thanksgiving.  I am thankful for the policy makers, regulators and food safety advocates who have supported the development of food safety legislation during the 111th Congress.  I sincerely hope that tomorrow we will be successful in taking another step towards enacting a law that will provide improved food protections for American families.