WASHINGTON, April 24 — Melamine, the chemical suspected in the deaths of pets around the country, was in food given to hogs and chickens in several states, and the Food and Drug Administration is trying to determine if the animals entered the human food supply, F.D.A. officials said Tuesday.
Go ahead, laugh at we who work hard to eat meat raised naturally, not factory-farmed.
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Early industrialization of food production actually made the food supply worse. Compared to what? What went before? Hardly. (And "The Jungle" is only a comparative work if you have a jones for Tolstoy's Noble Peasant.)
Modern pasteurization requirements are a direct result of child deaths from industrial milk production. Milk didn't rot or have dangerous microorganisms in 1885? Sorry ... but this is just rubbish history that confuses the occasion of a thing for the cause of a thing. Yes, the specific regulations on the food supply came as a result of muckraking against industrial food production (made possible by another "new thing" of the late-19th century -- the mass media). But that doesn't mean either (1) that earlier food produced "more naturally" was safer (it probably wasn't, simply because cleanliness generally and preservation means/technology were so incomparably inferior), or (2) that the specific hazards of industrial food production (solvable through regulation and technology) weren't worth the trade off gained in modern times' far greater abundance and reliability.
Our current relatively safe food supply is largely the results of a century of government regulation and public health measures. You forgot technology, which allows regulations to be met and more-stringent ones to be passed (how DOES one measure the allowable amount of rat shit in nonindustrial food) and is actually far more important in re general public-health. But more importantly, these regulations and measures are only tolerable in a society so rich and with food so abundant that it can afford the inefficiencies that they produce.
Victor What was different in the early years of industrialization was that bacteria could be much more widely spread. Before that, milk from one sick cow may have sickened a few families who used it. Industrialization meant that the sick cows milk went into a vat with milk from a few dozen healthy cows contaminating it all. Suddenly you were having city-wide outbreaks of food-borne illnesses. Sure, technology was a big help. Pasteurization, better preservation, and veternary antibiotics were probably the biggest improvements for food safety. But it was often regulatory measures that forced wide spread use of these tools. I'm no statist. I'm well aware of how quickly government can screw things up. But public food safety measures over the last century have generally done more good than harm.
But public food safety measures over the last century have generally done more good than harm. Rich, I saw nothing in Victor's writings to indicate that he was opposed to government safety regulations. If fact he seems to support them (e.g. "the specific hazards of industrial food production (solvable through regulation and technology").
This was so predictable. Wheat gluten is in so many products. The next place they will find it is as an additive in human foods.
We would do well to pay more for organic food and eat less food. Heathy diets and less obesity -- win-win situation. Plus better wages for US farmers and the immigrants who work their fields.
I'm not laughing. But I think we have more to be concerned about than just meat, as this section of the article shows: [The FDA] was expanding testing of imported ingredients and finished products that contain cornmeal, soy protein, rice bran and corn gluten. Those ingredients can be used to make many products, including breads, pastas, pizza dough, baby formulas, protein shakes and energy bars. That to me is the real kicker with this melamine contamination - is it in the thousands of refined-grain products that fill the "middle aisles" of grocery stores?
How much kidney disease in humans is related to possible melamine food contamination?
The China connection bothers me, too. If this were an American company that contaminated a food ingredient, they'd already be sued into bankruptcy. Instead, we don't even know where this garbage came from - the company connections are tenuous. Nor is there any criticism of China (our wonderful trade partner.) This one stinks for so many more reasons than simply sick dogs and cats.
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