Thread: They are awfully quiet about the tainted tomatoes?

Let's face it. We eat food daily that we "don't know where it's been." Food is processed, prepared and served by uninspected foreign nationals nearly everywhere. The head in the sand health department here won't even answer questions about it. Supporting the invasion is important and we're not.

Originally Posted by loservillelabor

Let's face it. We eat food daily that we "don't know where it's been." Food is processed, prepared and served by uninspected foreign nationals nearly everywhere. The head in the sand health department here won't even answer questions about it. Supporting the invasion is important and we're not.

I know one thing for sure that I am refusing to eat fast food ever again.For the second time in a few months I found hair in my food this time being a crunch wrap from taco bell when I returned it,the people working there thought it was funny as a few of them behind the counter were laughing openly.

And thats only what was on the outside,it makes me wonder what I have eaten in the past that I couldnt see.

Originally Posted by SOSADFORUS

Originally Posted by 5

Isn't there some way to read the numbers on barcodes to view the country of origin?

I don't know the answer to that, will ask my daughter she is a scan co ordinator for a major grocery chain....but there is no bar code on most of our produce.

No, you are right but isn't there a barcode on the bins? It might be hard to see but for my heath I could bend over and check.

I should have planted my garden larger and earlier this year.

Last week, my supermarket had red peppers on sale for 99 cents per pound, which is incredibly cheap and I LOVE red peppers. I started stuffing a bag with them. Upon closer inspection, I saw each pepper had a sticker - made in mexico. I couldn't put them back fast enough!

When I asked the produce manager about the low price and how come they had so many left, he told me even with the price dropping so low, people refuse to buy produce from mexico!

A few of us neighbors came up with a great plan. Once a week, we take turns driving to farm markets in neighboring states (or further away in our state) to purchase fresh produce. Even with the gas prices, it's cheaper and healthier.

NAFTA was BAD from the beginning because ALL it did was promulgate the rights of GREEDY business elites and their political cronies, NOT the GREATER good of the AVERAGE Canadian, American, and Mexican!

Check this out

http://www.fda.gov/oc/opacom/hottopics/tomatoes.html

http://news.aol.com/health/story/ar/_a/ ... 1009990002

Very Interesting thanks for the Link 93Camaro!


Tomatoes remain the top suspect and the advice on which ones consumers should avoid hasn't changed, stressed Food and Drug Administration food safety chief Dr. David Acheson.

However, he said it is possible that tomatoes being harvested in states considered safe could be picking up salmonella germs in packing sheds, warehouses or other facilities currently under investigation.

Most worrisome, the latest victim became sick on June 15 - long after the outbreak began on April 10 and weeks after government warnings stripped supermarkets and restaurants of many tomatoes.

"The source of contamination has been ongoing at least through early June. And we don't have any evidence that whatever the source is, it's been removed from the market," said Dr. Patricia Griffin of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Disease detectives at the CDC in Atlanta are double-checking their own probes just in case some other type of produce is really the culprit.

"We have also kept an open mind about other possibilities and are looking into other ingredients," Griffin said.

She wouldn't identify other potential suspects, except to say that from the beginning some patients have told the CDC they ate raw tomatoes in fresh salsa and guacamole. Officials have previously cleared jarred salsas.

For now, the FDA continues to urge consumers nationwide to avoid raw red plum, red Roma or red round tomatoes unless they were grown in specific states or countries that FDA has cleared of suspicion. Check FDA's Web site - http://www.fda.gov - for an updated list. Also safe are grape tomatoes, cherry tomatoes and tomatoes sold with the vine still attached.

But FDA's Acheson made clear that consumers should stay tuned in case that advice changes.

"The facts keep changing here. The outbreak is continuing," he said. "We need to re-examine all parts of this system and make sure that the consumer message is still solid."

FDA inspectors spent the last week chasing the best clues to date in the CSI-like hunt for the outbreak's source - but leads are growing cold.

Inspectors tested for traces of salmonella on farms in southern and central Florida and in three Mexican states, farms suspected to have harvested at least some of the tomatoes involved in the outbreak's earliest weeks. They also are following the path tomatoes took from those farms to packing houses and other distribution stops, testing water supplies and equipment along the way.

So far, "every single one" of 1,700 samples, mostly from farms, has been salmonella-free, a frustrated Acheson said Friday. Hundreds of other samples are still being tested.

Salmonella bacteria live in the intestinal tracts of people and animals. Food outbreaks typically are caused by direct contamination with animal feces or use of contaminated water on foods eaten raw or not fully cooked.

Fever, diarrhea and abdominal cramps typically start eight to 48 hours after infection and can last a week. Many people recover without treatment. In fact, the CDC estimates that for every confirmed salmonella patient, there can be 30 to 40 others who didn't see a doctor or weren't tested - although fewer are uncounted during headline-grabbing outbreaks.

But severe infection and death are possible. At least 95 people have been hospitalized in the current outbreak, and salmonella may have contributed to one person's death from cancer.

The outbreak's sheer scope - with illnesses being reported in 36 states and Washington, D.C. - and length make it unlikely that a single farm will be the culprit, Acheson acknowledged Friday.

That in turn points more suspicion at warehouses and other points in a tomato's path from farm to sale where bushels, even tons, may be repacked, or rewashed, or otherwise processed. Acheson said the investigation's big surprise is how many times tomatoes are repacked, as suppliers hand-pick their way through boxes to meet individual customers' demands for, say, small ripe tomatoes or larger greener ones.

And therein is a key problem: Some of the packing houses that handled suspect tomatoes from Florida and Mexico may now be handling freshly harvested tomatoes, Acheson said. FDA inspectors are hunting contamination in some of those packing houses now.

"Clearly the message is, we need to be looking at all possibilities," he said. "We need to re-examine all the information."

Originally Posted by Justonehero

Originally Posted by loservillelabor

Let's face it. We eat food daily that we "don't know where it's been." Food is processed, prepared and served by uninspected foreign nationals nearly everywhere. The head in the sand health department here won't even answer questions about it. Supporting the invasion is important and we're not.

I know one thing for sure that I am refusing to eat fast food ever again.For the second time in a few months I found hair in my food this time being a crunch wrap from taco bell when I returned it,the people working there thought it was funny as a few of them behind the counter were laughing openly.

And thats only what was on the outside,it makes me wonder what I have eaten in the past that I couldnt see.

That's very good advice! I do not know about fast food restraunts in other states, but here in California, they are almost exclusively staffed by illegal invaders, who speak very little English.

I will never set foot in a fast food joint again. It's clear to me the fast food lobby has persuaded the powers that be to allow illegal invaders to flourish, virtually untouched within the fast food industry.

The inspecors at the FDA knew what states the tomatoes werent from, and then they changed and said the tomatoes were from Mexico or Florida. Then Mexico got offended (boo-hoo cares), then they sent inspectors to Mexico and Florida. ITS ALL ABOUT NAFTA. I KNOW WHERE THOSE NASTY TOMATOES CAME FROM. BOYCOTT ANY FOOD THAT GROWS ON MEXICAN FARMS!

Originally Posted by butterbean

The inspecors at the FDA knew what states the tomatoes werent from, and then they changed and said the tomatoes were from Mexico or Florida. Then Mexico got offended (boo-hoo cares), then they sent inspectors to Mexico and Florida. ITS ALL ABOUT NAFTA. I KNOW WHERE THOSE NASTY TOMATOES CAME FROM. BOYCOTT ANY FOOD THAT GROWS ON MEXICAN FARMS!

I don't know why any kind of food especially produce is allowed in to the USA from Mexico. If you can't even drink the water from Mexico how is it okay to eat the produce that is watered by Mexican water? I don't understand the logic.