See the Post front page story and Food and Drug Administration website for a full list. Includes some Froot Loops, Apple Jacks, Corn Pops, and Honey Smacks for some dates of production, certainly not all of them.
See the Post front page story and Food and Drug Administration website for a full list. Includes some Froot Loops, Apple Jacks, Corn Pops, and Honey Smacks for some dates of production, certainly not all of them.
That's right. In this case, apparently the chemicals were in the packaging--the bags inside the cereal boxes. This of course is only one way contaminants can get into the food.
Check out the polls on food safety at makeourfoodsafe.org. What these show is that the public--including Democrats, Republicans, and Independents, all support strengthening and overhauling our food safety laws. Until that happens, FDA lacks the tools and resources to fully protect our food supply.
Check the FDA website and the Kellogg's website to be sure that the cereal you or your family have eaten was actually recalled. If so, you may want to contact both Kellogg's and the FDA (see their website) if you have any concerns, or had any health problems you think could be linked to the cereal.
I think FDA absolutely needs to play a key role in overseeing the safety o f the food supply. This is why pending legislation (S. 510, the Food Safety Modernization Act) that has been sitting in the Senate for a year since the House passed it, would give FDA new enforcement and oversight tools that it presently lacks, due to an outdated law. We are urging the Senate to move this bill as soon as possible.
One thing we need to do is give FDA an up-to-date law. The current law was originally signed by President Teddy Roosevelt, and most recently substantially updated in 1938--over 70 years ago. That's why a new food safety law like the bipartisan bill S. 510, pending in the Senate, is needed. It would make the food safety system more preventative, instead of reacting after contamination is discovered.
There are some apps that begin to address some of these issues, but a key problem is that there generally are not good publicly-available and up-to-date data on the presence and possible health effects many of the contaminants or ingredients in many foods, and in some of the packaging used for foods.
It would be good to see FDA check up on this and to independently confirm what was in the food and what its health effects might be.
I cannot answer that question specifically, but you should know that the Pew Health Group has recently decided to move forward with a program to evaluate the science on the possible health effects of many food additives.
FDA has the regulatory authority over about 80 percent of the food supply (USDA regulates meat and poultry, FDA most other foods). The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is supposed to regulate toxic chemicals used in all products; there is some overlapping jurisdiction, obviously, when it comes to chemicals used to package foods, for example. EPA's law for regulating chemicals, the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) is quite out of date and not very effective, according to the Government Accountability Office (gao.gov) and others, so Senator Lautenberg and Representatives Rush and Waxman has proposed to overhaul TSCA so toxic chemicals are better tested and regulated.
This approach has merit--it should be the company's burden to prove that the chemicals they use are safe. The government should check the data independently and confirm that this is correct.
There are food recalls announced virtually every week for a variety of reasons, ranging from contaminants in the packaging to bacterial contamination. So I would never say that it was impossible for another product to be contaminated, though I am not aware of any evidence that other cereals have the same problem.
I would suggest that you contact both Kellogg's and FDA (see websites earlier in the chat). It is important to make sure that these problems do not recur.