Another Oddity In Spinach Crisis
Though they have not published the information, FDA officials have been privately telling industry leaders they have determined that both organic and conventional product are implicated in the E. coli spinach situation. If this information is true, then this already odd food safety crisis gets odder still. Organic and conventional product would be grown in […]
Though Not ‘All-Clear’, Consumers
Can Eat Spinach Again
Things are still moving fast and furious in the spinach/E. coli crisis, although there is now some light at the end of the tunnel. Here is the Pundit’s fourth 10-point analysis of the constantly changing situation. You can read the three previous 10-point reviews here, here and here. Change in FDA advisory means the industry […]
Pundit Follow-Up
In a piece we ran on September 13, we analyzed a request made in the UK by the Organic Milk Suppliers Cooperative to the Food Standards Agency asking that organic milk be recognized as more nutritious than conventional milk. The Pundit was skeptical and… apparently, correct. The Food Standards Agency has concluded its review, including […]
Spinach Crisis Summary
With so much having been written in so short a time, thought it would be helpful to publish a sort of round-up of available material to help people understand the whole situation regarding spinach and this E. coli breakout: The Perishable Pundit itself has dealt extensively with the subject in several major pieces. On September […]
Is FDA Causing Long-term Damage?
Let us hope the news that the public health laboratory in New Mexico has isolated E. coli 0157:H7 from a partially used bag of spinach in the refrigerator of a patient who, it is believed, got sick from eating contaminated spinach will give the Food and Drug Administration the opportunity it has been looking for […]
Wal-Mart Deli/Bakery Has Crisis Of Its Own
The goal to eliminate all foodborne illness is laudable but probably unobtainable. The FDA is reporting over 140 cases of illness tied to the E. coli 0157:H7 outbreak in spinach. That sounds like a lot of sick people, but the Indiana State Department of Public Health reports that: “…the source of the recent salmonella outbreak […]
Growing Pains
The overwhelming response to our analysis of the spinach outbreak required a risky mid-day shift to greater server capacity. We are proud to say the Pundit never went down. Unfortunately our e-mail capabilities did go down for awhile. We apologize for this and want you to know how important your communication is to us. If […]
Spinach Recall Begs For Solutions
Long after all the contaminated spinach is off the shelves, the spinach crisis goes on. We have already discussed the impact of this crisis on fresh-cuts here, on organics here, given an initial take on ten points raised by this outbreak here and pointed out that the FDA is now acting beyond any reasonable concern […]
Peculiarities About The E. coli Outbreak
There are certain odd things about what the FDA is saying happened that really don’t make sense. How is it possible for so many brands to be implicated? Even if they come from the same packing plant, it doesn’t make sense. These items are batch processed. If Natural Selection Foods is packing for Dole, it […]
United’s Government Relations Challenge
Last week we lauded the launch of the new United Fresh Produce Association, formed as a result of the merger between the United Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Association and the International Fresh-cut Produce Association. The big kick off for the association was at United’s Washington Public Policy Conference. This is United’s great event, the one […]
