But officials have still not pinpointed the source of the contamination. Nor do they know the country or state where the tainted produce was grown, despite a rule issued by the Food and Drug Administration under the bioterrorism law that was intended to give federal officials a way to respond immediately to threats to the nation's food supply.
The rule requires importers, processors and distributors to keep track of where they buy produce and where it goes. A major hurdle facing investigators in this outbreak, however, is that processors frequently repack boxes of tomatoes to meet a buyer's demands. In doing so, officials said, they are not required to record the tomatoes' farm, state or even country of origin.
"The purpose of the recordkeeping provision of the Bioterrorism Act was to support going back to the origin of food after people have gotten sick when you are trying to find out how the biological agent got there," said Michael Taylor, a professor at George Washington University and a former FDA official. "But the provisions are of little or no value with respect to trace-backs of fresh produce because of the amount of shoe leather and time it would take."
What's interesting here? First of all - they quote Michael Taylor. I was wondering what he was up to these days. He's the poster boy for the "revolving door" between industry and government.
But second of all - what does this say about having a centralized food system as we do now? Either they need much MUCH more tracking and accountability or else we'll continue to have problems like this. I say give up on the centralized disaster of a food system and support local food.
