Our view protecting pets and people: Food scares reveal FDA is
overwhelmed, understaffed*

Imports flood in fast, but the agency lacks funds, authority.

By the time federal officials learned in March that a Canadian company
was recalling tainted cat and dog food from U.S. stores, it was too late
for hundreds of family pets who had been sickened or killed by the products.

The Food and Drug Administration's discovery of dangerous food-borne
diseases was equally tardy when the culprit was green onions from Mexico
in 2003 or California spinach just last September. The victims in those
cases were human. Onions carrying the hepatitis A virus killed three
people; another three died from eating tainted spinach.

The string of deadly outbreaks reveals an agency that is too often
caught off guard. By every measure, the agency is overwhelmed and
understaffed, leaving it unable to keep dangerous foods out of
supermarkets or out of the country.

While imports under FDA regulation — such as the adulterated Chinese
wheat gluten that sickened pets and was fed to chickens and hogs — have
increased more than sixfold in the past decade, the FDA has a smaller
field staff to inspect products than it did in 2003.

This is just plain foolish. The FDA's budget of $1.8 billion this year
amounts to just 0.063% of federal spending, so a substantial increase in
its capabilities would barely register on the budget meter. Such an
increase could, however, lead to substantial improvements in the safety
of about 80% of the food supply. The Agriculture Department, which
regulates meat, poultry and eggs, gets nearly three times as much food
safety money.

Funding and personnel are only part of the problem, however. FDA also
lacks authority to hold companies accountable for living up to food
safety standards.

Manufacturers and importers primarily police themselves, and responsible
operators have ample incentive to do the job right. Spinach growers, for
example, have yet to recover from the outbreaks last year. But imported
food poses tougher problems, particularly if it comes from countries
where laws are less rigorous.

The pet food episode revealed that companies are turning to Chinese
suppliers for cheaper ingredients. Some unscrupulous suppliers there
used contaminants that falsely appear to boost protein content, fooling
U.S. companies and pumping up profits. Preventing this kind of deception
requires the sort of authority the FDA lacks.

The Agriculture Department's system for regulating meat could serve as a
model. It requires foreign meatpacking plants to live up to U.S.
standards if they want to export here; all meat imports must come into
just 10 U.S. ports, where inspectors concentrate their resources. By
contrast, FDA-regulated food imports pour in through hundreds of ports
and border crossings. The FDA inspects only 1% of the imported food it
regulates, and it can stop an import only at the border.

Safety advocates have been clamoring for years for changes at the FDA,
and now, finally, they have Congress' attention. Lawmakers are pushing
measures to give the FDA power to order food recalls and require
companies to report if they suspect food is tainted.

Former FDA commissioner David Kessler reminded Congress on Tuesday that
no other federal agency "touches the lives of so many people so
directly." Congress and the administration are obliged to give it the
money, staff and authority to keep those lives safe.