The Food and Drug Administration will release three much-needed food safety rules in November that will make the fresh produce and imported foods on Americans’ plates safer. The problem is, Congress’s spending bills for the coming year provide FDA with less than half of the additional funding it needs to ensure that food producers understand and comply with these and other requirements of FSMA, the 2010 law that promotes safety of the food supply.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that contaminated food causes 48 million illnesses, 128,000 hospitalizations, and as many as 3,000 deaths in the United States every year. The FDA is working to reduce those numbers, but the support of your representative is essential to ensure that this opportunity is not lost.
The urgent need for FSMA’s prevention-based rules is underscored by an ongoing outbreak linked to Salmonella in imported cucumbers. More than 700 people have been sickened across 35 states, including 150 hospitalizations and four deaths.
Additional funding will modernize FDA’s approach to food safety—a system designed to prevent illness, reduce associated costs for the American agriculture industry, and fully support efforts to level the playing field for domestic growers and processors so that food produced overseas meets U.S. safety standards.