USDA Official Admits `We Can Do Better’

WASHINGTON _ The top food safety official at the U.S. Department of Agriculture said Thursday that “we know we can do better” when requesting timely food recalls, and he vowed the department would launch a review of the nation’s estimated 1,500 packing plants to determine they have adequate safeguards to prevent E. coli bacteria from infecting meat.

The statement by Richard Raymond, the undersecretary of agriculture for food safety, came in response to questions over the USDA’s nearly three-week delay in deciding to call for the large scale recall last month of hamburger contaminated with E. coli.

So far, 29 people have fallen ill after consuming hamburgers made by Topps Meats Co. of Elizabeth, N.J.

The Chicago Tribune on Wednesday cited an internal USDA e-mail that stated that the agency confirmed on Sept. 7 the presence of E. coli in hamburger meat that sickened a Florida teenager. But it wasn’t until 18 days later, on Sept. 25, that the agency recommended to Topps Meats that a recall was necessary. By law, the USDA cannot order recalls; it can only recommend them.

Topps announced its recall of 331,000 pounds of frozen hamburger patties that day. But four days later, it expanded the recall to 21.7 million pounds _ a full year’s production.

Raymond took issue with the Tribune story, saying that the delay in launching the recall was 11 days, not 18.

David Goldman, another USDA food safety official, told reporters in a telephone conference call that the delay occurred because the department needed to conduct additional tests on the suspect meat. Those tests, he said, were necessary to confirm that the bacteria strain in the meat was the same that sickened 15-year-old Samantha Safranek of Pembroke Pines, Fla.

The extra tests were not complete until Sept. 14 _ 11 days before the recall began.

That 11-day delay, Goldman said, occurred because tests on meat provided by Topps did not show E coli. The agency then waited _ choosing not to warn the public _ until two more E. coli illnesses cases surfaced in New York. State tests proved that the illnesses were caused by the consumption of tainted Topps meat.

New York state officials said they issued a consumer alert immediately upon learning of a single case of E coli in the Topps meat. In fact, the New York warning went out before the recall was announced.

Goldman agreed that the department did not move aggressively enough, and that it is now reviewing its procedures.

“This agency is not completely satisfied with the time elapsed and the issuance of the recall,” he said. “We will be reviewing data related to this recall as well as our own protocol to determine how we might improve.”

The USDA maintained inspectors at the Topps plants on a continuous basis, and Raymond said the agency is investigating why those inspectors did not uncover the E. coli problem. A team of USDA inspectors examined the plant after the recall began and found several food safety violations and ordered that the grinding of hamburger meat be suspended, he said.

Those violations include the company’s failure to provide paperwork that shows its suppliers took precautions to prevent E coli contamination during beef processing, USDA officials said.

Topps does not slaughter cattle at its plant, but rather buys meat from meat packing companies and uses that to make its frozen hamburger patties, which are sold under several different labels.

The Florida teen, Samantha Safranak, suffered stomach cramps, bloody diarrhea and urine and eventually a form of kidney failure after eating a Topps hamburger on Aug. 17. Her mother told a Broward County, Fla., health investigator that the hamburger was pink in the middle. Health officials recommend cooking hamburger to an internal temperature of 160 degrees to kill any E. coli bacteria.

E. coli is a bacteria that can live in cattle intestines, and it can contaminate meat during the slaughter process. The number of E. coli-related recalls has jumped this year, after several years of fewer recalls.

“We had three really good years of E. coli declining,” Raymond said, adding that, “something happened this summer.”

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