Rat Filth, Insect Filth, even Rat Poo is allowed in US Foods - Lovely

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SirGalahad

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As crazy as it sounds the US has some of the lowest food standards for a developed nation. The issue of chlorinated chicken is simply and cheap and ineffective way to overcome the poor animal welfare in the US. The result is the US has a greater level of food borne illnesses per head of population.


Also the US use of synthetic growth hormone-loaded animal feed, and chemical-releasing implants in cattle, banned in the EU over cancer-causing concerns.

But will leave the best to the last - FDA's own "Food Defect Levels Handbook" which sets out the maximum number of foreign bodies that are acceptable in US food products.

https://www.fda.gov/food/ingredient...atory-information/food-defect-levels-handbook

Insect and Rat filth in peanut butter or Rat poo in Ginger is allowed.

But the kicker is that the US wants to water down food labelling standards as well so you will not really know where or how your food is processed.

Yes Rat Poo Food - that's what you voted for.

As to the level of Food poisoning.

https://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/foodborne-germs.html

CDC estimates that each year 48 million people get sick from a foodborne illness, 128,000 are hospitalized, and 3,000 die, around 14.8% of the population.

While salmonella is estimated to cause 1.2 million illnesses annually, infecting approximately 0.37% of Americans, around 0.4% of the population get sick as a result of campylobacter, with 1.3 million cases estimated each year.

However, cases in the UK are much lower., just 0.096% of the population were affected by campylobacter in 2017, with just under 64,000 cases estimated.

Meanwhile, instances of salmonella were even less frequent. Just 0.015% of UK citizens were infected in 2017, with 10,089 cases confirmed.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/zoonoses-uk-annual-reports
 
EFLImpudence said:
Is it not allowed - at all - in UK food?
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EU guidelines as far as I can find out there are no allowable limits. The results are in the proof of the pudding - look at UK vs US food borne illnesses I believe in the US its about 5x more prevalent per head of population and we want to throw our food standards down the drain.
 
Brexit was always an elitist fantasy to cut regulations and protections - it was sold to public that all we needed was a bonfire of red tape that was holding us back and stopping us controlling immigration. Reality is like those US truckers who bought the lie from Trump that he would improve their life - well he's now raised their taxes so now they have to pay thousands of dollars more each year and has cut regulation on the amount of hours they can work - so now we will have truckers working longer hours for less.
 
Im not saying I disagree, as the food poisoning rates stand for themselves, however this article gives a different slant on the contamination.

In reality, there is actually no practical distinction in the way that the two administrations – the US and the EU - deal with food contamination. On both sides of the Atlantic it is recognised that foods naturally grown in a contaminated environment will, from time to time, carry an amount of that contamination acquired through growing, harvesting, storage and processing.

And, as the FDA says in the introduction to its Handbook, "it is economically impractical to grow, harvest, or process raw products that are totally free of non-hazardous, naturally occurring, unavoidable defects".

Payne, by the way, calls it the "Defects Levels Handbook", with defects in the plural. The exact title is "Defect Levels Handbook" – a small point, but indicative of a lack of attention to detail.

A more substantive failure is in Payne's assertion that US producers are "allowed" to include specified levels of foreign bodies in their food. But to cast the levels specified in that light is wholly misleading.

What the FDA is saying in setting levels is that these are "action levels", the limits at which FDA will regard the food product "adulterated" - subject to enforcement action under Section 402(a)(3) of the Food, Drug, and Cosmetics Act. In other words, anything above the levels specified is open to prosecution without any further consideration.

But that does not mean that the FDA is setting tolerance limits. That is not the case. Rather, if natural levels of contamination do not exceed the levels, producers are spared automatic prosecution – as long as they are taking all necessary measures to reduce the levels

http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=87019
 
SirGalahad said:
EU guidelines as far as I can find out there are no allowable limits. The results are in the proof of the pudding - look at UK vs US food borne illnesses I believe in the US its about 5x more prevalent per head of population and we want to throw our food standards down the drain.
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Fake news.

You can find no allowable limit levels for in EU guidelines for the sorts of contamination your refer to not because they are zero but they don't exist. They are not zero because it is not achievable to have zero contamination in naturally produced food.

Big difference between the EU and the US is how they apply and enforce rules relating to contamination in food production.

In the EU it is up to the food producer to demonstrate due diligence and that they have taken all practicable steps to minimise contamination. If someone makes an complaint or contamination is found on inspection, environmental health investigates and if they find that the producer has not taken reasonable and practicable steps to minimise contamination then enforcement action may be applied. If the producer has taken reasonable steps, then the producer will not be prosecuted, irrelevent of the level of contamination.

The US Defect Levels Handbook defines action levels, not allowable limits. If produce has levels of contamination higher than that defined in the handbook, then prosecution of the producer is automatic, irrelevant of cause.

In the EU, actionable levels of contamination vary from country to country and inspector to inspector. in the US, they are predefined.
 
Lower said:
Fake news.

You can find no allowable limit levels for in EU guidelines for the sorts of contamination your refer to not because they are zero but they don't exist. They are not zero because it is not achievable to have zero contamination in naturally produced food.

Big difference between the EU and the US is how they apply and enforce rules relating to contamination in food production.

In the EU it is up to the food producer to demonstrate due diligence and that they have taken all practicable steps to minimise contamination. If someone makes an complaint or contamination is found on inspection, environmental health investigates and if they find that the producer has not taken reasonable and practicable steps to minimise contamination then enforcement action may be applied. If the producer has taken reasonable steps, then the producer will not be prosecuted, irrelevent of the level of contamination.

The US Defect Levels Handbook defines action levels, not allowable limits. If produce has levels of contamination higher than that defined in the handbook, then prosecution of the producer is automatic, irrelevant of cause.

In the EU, actionable levels of contamination vary from country to country and inspector to inspector. in the US, they are predefined.
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Action levels are triggered when you go above them so by definition they are allowed below that level.

So are US food standards higher than UK food standards?

Why do they want to water down food labelling standards as well?

I am genuinely interested in this. The can you explain why there are higher levels of food borne illnesses in the US?
 
SirGalahad said:
Action levels are triggered when you go above them so by definition they are allowed below that level.
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No, that is you making an assumption to support your argument.

Statement from the introduction of the FDA document that you posted:

'It is incorrect to assume that because the FDA has an established defect action level for a food commodity, the food manufacturer need only stay just below that level.'

If you exceed the action level, prosecution is automatic. If your manufacturing processes are poor, you may still be prosecuted even if you are below the action level.

Try reading the article in the link posted by Notch7. Its quite informative.
 
The don’t do too bad on it. Have you seen how many fat yanks there are?
 
It's very difficult to compare between the two as there AFIAK no eu wide method of collecting food poisoning stats amongst it's members.

Whilst no fan of what I read about US food standards, it's not possible to compare the 2 directly. After all would EU consumers be happy if they knew some of their food was gamma ray irradiated.

It's a tricky one for sure to be quantitative about.

Also whilst not accepting any level of foreign contaminants in food, it's not possible to set a level of zero, so rest assured you've eaten your fair share of EU rodent droppings, flies etc.
 
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