Archive for the ‘FDA’ Category

Thousands of additives get into food without the FDA ensuring their safety.

A newly released report has criticized America’s food safety watchdog for systemically failing to ensure the safety of what food manufacturers put in what we eat.
After months of research, the Government Accountability Office told Congress it was concerned about a well-known loophole in the Food and Drug Administration regulations that for decades has concerned consumer [...]

An almost invisible path of food poisoning.

It’s happening again. A single salmonella-contaminated food item is forcing recalls of scores of other products throughout the country.
We went though this last year with contaminated peanuts from the Georgia and Texas plants of Peanut Corporation of America.
PCA recalled the tainted goobers, but the ripple effect spread for weeks as hundreds of manufacturers pulled thousands [...]

Now it’s red pepper you need to watch out for.

Remember last year’s epic recall of salmonella-tainted peanuts? The number of food manufacturers added to the recall list grew to more than a thousand over the following weeks because, it turned out, they were all buying goobers from Peanut Corporation of America.
Well, it may be happening again, but this [...]

Last year was a rough one for food safety. Will 2010 be any better?

Over the holidays I wrote about a meal we all wanted to avoid.
For the appetizer: San Antonio Bay oysters polluted with Noroviruses. For the main course: grilled beef infected with E. coli from contaminated tenderizing needles; chicken with Campylobacter or imported ham with Listeria monocytogenes. Then there’s a side dish of stuffing loaded with salmonella-contaminated [...]

Democrats who anguished over dangerous popcorn butter flavoring are doing little now that they have the power.

The chemical in butter flavoring for popcorn and other foods that has sickened hundreds of workers, killed a handful and destroyed the lungs of at least three microwave popcorn addicts may be back.
In fact, it appears it never went away, despite promises from the food industry.

It looks like vinegar lovers, especially parents, now have something else to worry about

Balsamic vinegar has been coveted by Italians for centuries. Over the past 30 or so years the popularity in the U.S. of the dark, syrupy ambrosia has soared and has become loved by foodies, used sparingly by chefs and often too liberally by home cooks.
Forgetting the exquisite culinary joy that comes with the almost magical [...]

Nanoparticles used to target tumors can cause DNA damage across the body’s protective barriers

A team of British researchers is raising new and serious questions about the health risks posed by nanoparticles.

Kellogg’s claim that Cocoa Krispies boosts kids’ immunity spikes blood pressure of parents, prosecutors

I was in a grocery store yesterday when yells and curses drew me to the cereal aisle, where two women seemed to be having a total nut-out.  One was stomping on several brightly colored cereal boxes and the other was waving a box of the same cereal in the face of anyone who paused long [...]

The skin of a pumpkin skin may scare away germs

Pumpkins are the universal symbols of Fall and Halloween. But now, researchers have found that the skin of that pumpkin you carved into a Jack-o’-Lantern contains a substance that could put a scare into microbes that cause millions infections in adults and infants each year.

The chemical industry hides behind touchy-feely name and Obama’s OMB acts a lot like it did under Bush.

The Coalition for Chemical Safety sounds like just the kind of group to which environmental activists would swarm.