FDA commissioner says agency needs more authority

[cal04]

Source: Associated Press

Food and Drug Administration chief Margaret Hamburg said Monday her agency is limited by law to a mostly reactive stance on food safety and argued that it needs a more "preventive approach."

Giving a series of network interviews in the wake of the egg and salmonella breakout, Hamburg said the FDA is taking the issue "very, very seriously." At the same time, she said Congress should pass pending legislation that would provide her agency with greater enforcement power, including new authority over imported food.

"We need better abilities and authorities to put in place these preventive controls and hold companies accountable," Hamburg said as she discussed the approximately 1,300 cases of salmonella poisoning and the recall of roughly a half-billion eggs from two Iowa egg distributors.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100823/ap_on_bi_ge/us_tainted_eggs

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FDA chief says more eggs may be recalled
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38813154/ns/health-food_safety/

[Odin2005]

1. Given how the agency is owned by the industry it is supposed to regulated, FUCK NO!!!

Give them more power and they will just go after small businesses in order to enrich the big guys.

[demground]

2. More power means more corruption

With FDA's track record for poor food safety measures in the
last 10 years,  allowing GM foods to enter our food chain and
dangerous drugs to be sold on the shelves, giving more power
to them would mean giving more power to the corporations that
own FDA!

[The Northerner]

13. +1

[zenj8]

3. Absolutely not!!

The agency doesn't use the authority it already has to protect people. This is an attempt to force pasteurization of eggs, taking the life force out of them. This agency only wants us to eat "dead" food. Their long range goal is to use radiation to kill the life giving enzymes in our food. Just say no. They should have been going after the egg producers whose operations are unsanitary. Levy fines and force them to clean up. They already have the authority to do that but they don't.

[Lightning Count]

5. Life force?

Does raw chicken have more life force than cooked chicken?

I will never rally against pasteurization.

[zipplewrath]

8. Newtons

Do we measure life force in Newtons, or pounds?

[xocet]

14. Hmmm....

Life force (vis viva) is probably measured in either (slug-ft)/(s^2) or in (slug-ft^2)/(s^2). It depends on whether the earlier poster is attempting any form of accuracy. Are enzymes related to life force or to life energy?

At any rate, I think that the mentioning of the slug in the unit for life force/energy is important, since everyone knows that slugs are abundant in life-giving enzymes.

Thus, it is critically important that the FDA be prohibited from requiring any pasteurization of slugs.

[zenj8]

9. I believe the discussion is about eggs, not chickens.

Pasteurization is not necessary when it comes to live foods. We need the enzymes in the foods which pasteurization and radiation destroy. Perhaps you should do some research...

[Lightning Count]

12. Why do raw eggs have more enzymes than raw chickens?

Aren't they one and the same? What about raw beef? Do we need those enzymes as well?

[Odin2005]

6. *rolls eyes*

:eyes:

[xocet]

7. What a bizarre comment! Life force? n/t

[zenj8]

10. enzymes....not bizarre if you know anything about them.

[xocet]

15. Please list the enzymes that are present and, as a result, are destroyed. Thanks.... n/t

[pattmarty]

4. I think every one of the Federal agencies have been neutered..........

...........These agencies have been 180'd to protect the particular industry that they cover, instead of protecting the public from the industry as what was intended of them. This country now has become one BIG CORPORATE JOKE.

[mike r]

11. I don't want shit in my food.

It's simple.