http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-tainted-foodmay27,0,3491844.story?page=1
WASHINGTON — A congressional committee is investigating whether some private U.S. laboratories were instructed to withhold samples of tainted food so that importers could get their goods into the United States.
In a May 1 letter to 10 labs, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce suggests they may have been encouraged by importing companies to discard test results that had failed Food and Drug Administration standards.
"We're gathering information from both the FDA and private industry about the labs almost being complicit in helping importers game the system," said Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), chairman of the Oversight and Investigations subcommittee that is investigating the labs and food companies. "Someone told us you pay for the result you want to get from the labs."
The committee's letter reiterates Stupak's suspicion that testing on some samples was conducted repeatedly until the food passed.
FDA kept in dark
In other instances, the letter says, importers whose food failed tests at one laboratory would hire a different lab to continue testing until they got a positive result.
"This repeated testing is done without alerting FDA that potentially dangerous food has been imported into this country — a practice which we find deplorable," the letter states.
The committee asked 50 multinational food companies for a wide range of recall- and food-import records dating to 2000.
A May 8 letter from the committee to the companies asks about instances when food was found to be contaminated with chemicals or bacteria such as E. coli, salmonella or listeria.
"We wish to assess the extent of microbiological and/or chemical contamination occurring during the processing of food and the extent to which controls have failed to prevent or eliminate contamination in food," the committee wrote.
Three Chicago-area corporations—Kraft Foods Inc., Sara Lee Corp. and the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co.—are included in the second request.
The committee's investigation springs from previous hearings on the effectiveness of the FDA and U.S. Department of Agriculture in enforcing food safety through inspections and recalls.
The role of food testing laboratories became an issue in February, when the CEO of one private lab, Anresco Laboratories of San Francisco, said private labs don't always tell the FDA when tests show that imported food may be contaminated.
That executive, David Eisenberg, told the committee that the FDA "requires that we sign a laboratory director's statement that we're submitting all work that we've done on a sample."
In reality, he said, the importers that hire the labs control where the test results go.
"If the importer tells us not to submit the information to the FDA, the FDA never sees it," Eisenberg testified. "Sometimes they want to keep a clean record on their item with the FDA."
In an interview, Eisenberg said that a check of his company's records revealed that it withheld samples from the FDA at a company's request an average of three times a month. He said the labs break no laws by withholding such information.
"We are employed by the imported-food manufacturer," Eisenberg said. "We are not employed by the FDA, and the FDA has no authority over private labs that are generating imported-food test results, so we have to follow the advice of our customer."
Dr. David Acheson, the FDA's assistant commissioner for food protection, said the role of private labs is to determine whether importers are complying with requirements outlined in alerts that the FDA issues for certain goods. But those test results, he acknowledged, belong to the companies.
"They're not required to send us the whole bundle of testing that they have done," he said. "For the vast majority, these are done by labs that we're familiar with."
That familiarity, Acheson said, reduces the possibility that importing companies "lab shop" until they get positive test results. In those instances, he said, "Our guys would probably smell a rat."
Acheson said he favors congressional proposals that would allow the FDA to accredit private labs, which could give the agency more access to test results and methods.
The potential danger in some imported foods became the subject of scrutiny in March 2007, when pet food ingredients made in China were found to be contaminated with melamine, a compound used to make plastic.
Since then, the FDA has reversed a decision to close 7 of the 13 agency labs it operates and has pledged to expand the inspection of food imports, which have exploded in recent years.
Last autumn the FDA issued an alert on five types of Chinese seafood: eel, shrimp, catfish, basa and dace. The warning was recognition of the fast-growing Asian aquaculture industry and its frequent use of antibiotics banned in the United States.
8 labs not complying
To import those seafoods, companies affected by the alert must prove that their products don't contain banned substances. Conducting tests to prove it is one of the jobs the private labs perform.
So far, just 2 of the 10 labs targeted by the House committee have complied with the records request, according to committee staffers.
Amir Jalaeikhoo, president of one lab that did comply, Imperial Private Laboratories Inc. of Miami, said that his firm reports negative test results to the FDA. Imperial mostly tests for pesticides in produce imported from Central and South America, Jalaeikhoo said.
"Sometimes we lose clients because our standard operating procedure is that basically if something is ... in violation, we submit it," he said. "Some importers don't like that policy."
Officials of the other labs did not comment.
Of the Chicago-area multinationals asked to provide records, Kraft and Sara Lee said they were complying with the House request.
"We take an end-to-end approach to food safety and build it in from start to finish—from product development through production, distribution and product use," said spokeswoman Susan Davison of Kraft Foods.
Sara Matheu of Sara Lee said her company is cooperating. "We have received the letter and will respond with appropriate information as requested," she said.
The Wrigley Jr. Co. did not respond to a call.
WASHINGTON — A congressional committee is investigating whether some private U.S. laboratories were instructed to withhold samples of tainted food so that importers could get their goods into the United States.
In a May 1 letter to 10 labs, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce suggests they may have been encouraged by importing companies to discard test results that had failed Food and Drug Administration standards.
"We're gathering information from both the FDA and private industry about the labs almost being complicit in helping importers game the system," said Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), chairman of the Oversight and Investigations subcommittee that is investigating the labs and food companies. "Someone told us you pay for the result you want to get from the labs."
The committee's letter reiterates Stupak's suspicion that testing on some samples was conducted repeatedly until the food passed.
FDA kept in dark
In other instances, the letter says, importers whose food failed tests at one laboratory would hire a different lab to continue testing until they got a positive result.
"This repeated testing is done without alerting FDA that potentially dangerous food has been imported into this country — a practice which we find deplorable," the letter states.
The committee asked 50 multinational food companies for a wide range of recall- and food-import records dating to 2000.
A May 8 letter from the committee to the companies asks about instances when food was found to be contaminated with chemicals or bacteria such as E. coli, salmonella or listeria.
"We wish to assess the extent of microbiological and/or chemical contamination occurring during the processing of food and the extent to which controls have failed to prevent or eliminate contamination in food," the committee wrote.
Three Chicago-area corporations—Kraft Foods Inc., Sara Lee Corp. and the Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co.—are included in the second request.
The committee's investigation springs from previous hearings on the effectiveness of the FDA and U.S. Department of Agriculture in enforcing food safety through inspections and recalls.
The role of food testing laboratories became an issue in February, when the CEO of one private lab, Anresco Laboratories of San Francisco, said private labs don't always tell the FDA when tests show that imported food may be contaminated.
That executive, David Eisenberg, told the committee that the FDA "requires that we sign a laboratory director's statement that we're submitting all work that we've done on a sample."
In reality, he said, the importers that hire the labs control where the test results go.
"If the importer tells us not to submit the information to the FDA, the FDA never sees it," Eisenberg testified. "Sometimes they want to keep a clean record on their item with the FDA."
In an interview, Eisenberg said that a check of his company's records revealed that it withheld samples from the FDA at a company's request an average of three times a month. He said the labs break no laws by withholding such information.
"We are employed by the imported-food manufacturer," Eisenberg said. "We are not employed by the FDA, and the FDA has no authority over private labs that are generating imported-food test results, so we have to follow the advice of our customer."
Dr. David Acheson, the FDA's assistant commissioner for food protection, said the role of private labs is to determine whether importers are complying with requirements outlined in alerts that the FDA issues for certain goods. But those test results, he acknowledged, belong to the companies.
"They're not required to send us the whole bundle of testing that they have done," he said. "For the vast majority, these are done by labs that we're familiar with."
That familiarity, Acheson said, reduces the possibility that importing companies "lab shop" until they get positive test results. In those instances, he said, "Our guys would probably smell a rat."
Acheson said he favors congressional proposals that would allow the FDA to accredit private labs, which could give the agency more access to test results and methods.
The potential danger in some imported foods became the subject of scrutiny in March 2007, when pet food ingredients made in China were found to be contaminated with melamine, a compound used to make plastic.
Since then, the FDA has reversed a decision to close 7 of the 13 agency labs it operates and has pledged to expand the inspection of food imports, which have exploded in recent years.
Last autumn the FDA issued an alert on five types of Chinese seafood: eel, shrimp, catfish, basa and dace. The warning was recognition of the fast-growing Asian aquaculture industry and its frequent use of antibiotics banned in the United States.
8 labs not complying
To import those seafoods, companies affected by the alert must prove that their products don't contain banned substances. Conducting tests to prove it is one of the jobs the private labs perform.
So far, just 2 of the 10 labs targeted by the House committee have complied with the records request, according to committee staffers.
Amir Jalaeikhoo, president of one lab that did comply, Imperial Private Laboratories Inc. of Miami, said that his firm reports negative test results to the FDA. Imperial mostly tests for pesticides in produce imported from Central and South America, Jalaeikhoo said.
"Sometimes we lose clients because our standard operating procedure is that basically if something is ... in violation, we submit it," he said. "Some importers don't like that policy."
Officials of the other labs did not comment.
Of the Chicago-area multinationals asked to provide records, Kraft and Sara Lee said they were complying with the House request.
"We take an end-to-end approach to food safety and build it in from start to finish—from product development through production, distribution and product use," said spokeswoman Susan Davison of Kraft Foods.
Sara Matheu of Sara Lee said her company is cooperating. "We have received the letter and will respond with appropriate information as requested," she said.
The Wrigley Jr. Co. did not respond to a call.
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