• by Thom Forbes  @tforbes, September 11, 2015

In the wake of highly publicized food contamination incidents such as this year’s listeria outbreak at Blue Bell Creameries, the Food and Drug Administration issued two stringent food safety regulations Thursday to stem outbreaks of food-borne illnesses that kill about 3,000 people annually in the U.S. One in six Americans — about 48 million people — get sick every year from food they ingest, according to the Centers for Disease Control, and 128,000 of them require hospitalization.

“The new regulations are intended to make food processors anticipate where germs might be getting into food products — and work ahead of time to prevent them,” writes Maggie Fox for NBCNews.com. “It sounds like common sense, but current regulations only require that food manufacturers, distributors and regulators respond only once an outbreak starts.”

Michael Taylor, the FDA’s deputy commissioner for foods and veterinary medicine, told reporters on a conference call that “the preventive controls rules draw on industry best practices, which many food producers already apply in their operations,” writes Lydia Zuraw for Food Safety News. They’ve been further “shaped by public comments and conversations with farmers, consumers, industry and academics.” 

Described by the FDA as “the most sweeping reform of our food safety laws in more than 70 years,” Congress passed the Food Safety Modernization Act in 2010. It was signed into law by President Barack Obama on Jan. 4, 2011. Implementation, however, has been operating on government time. There’s more to come.

“The seven major rules that comprise the law — all due to be finalized next year — are aimed at modernizing food-manufacturing processes after a wave of deadly outbreaks in the past decade stemming from contaminated fruit, spinach, peanut butter and other products,” reports Jesse Newman for the Wall Street Journal.

“Even after the rules have taken effect, the FDA faces significant challenges, including securing adequate funding from Congress. Mr. Taylor said the FDA will need $260 million to fully implement and enforce the seven major food safety rules, including $109.5 million for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. President Barack Obama has requested that amount, but appropriations bills in both the House and Senate allocate just $41.5 million and $45 million, respectively, for fiscal 2016.”

The Pew Charitable Trust, which has been aggressively advocating for improved food safety regulations, has an infographic with five reasons to support the FDA’s budget request, including the fact that it includes $11.5 million to “provide food producers with technical assistance in meeting the new requirements.”

The Grocery Manufacturers Association, which the Washington Post’s Brady Dennis reports has “at times clashed with the FDA's regulatory efforts,” was positive about new rules and praised the agency for the “deliberative and inclusive approach it took in developing these regulations.”

Other industry associations, such as the Food Marketing Institute,  “commended the FDA” on finalizing the rules, Julie Gallagher reports for Supermarket News. 

“We appreciate and value the collaborative working relationships cultivated by FDA during the development of these rules, and we believe a comprehensive, systemic approach to food safety will continue to provide Americans with the safest possible food supply,” said American Frozen Food Institute president and CEO Kraig R. Naasz.

William Marler, a Seattle attorney who has represented victims of food-borne illness, tellsUSA Today’s Greg Toppo and Karen Weintraub that “the preventative controls go a long way to making manufactured food safer. The good news for the public and business is that there will likely be fewer illnesses and fewer lawsuits —which is a good thing.”

Food makers will now need to keep records, reports Sabrina Tavernise for the New York Times — “effectively a sort of safety activity log for the production center, and FDA inspectors will have the right to review them. That is a big change.”

David Plunkett, a senior staff lawyer at the Center for Science in the Public Interest’s food safety program, points to a 2007 incident when “an operator at a Peter Pan peanut butter factory refused to hand over records to an FDA inspector, and some months later, around 600 people fell ill from its products.”

“It was like telling the police you can go where the robbery is happening,” Plunkett tells Tavernise, “but you don’t have the right to search for the robber.” 

Blue Bell Creameries, meanwhile, is phasing in delivery to stores in the South after overhauling its facilities over the past five months — a development that had some of its devoted fans In Corpus Christi, Texas, in a frenzy yesterday after they spotted delivery trucks on the freeway. Alas, they were just keeping fit for when delivery in the area actually resumes in November, reports Veronica Flores for Kristv.com.