H.R. 830, IMPORTED FOOD SAFETY ACT OF 1999

• The General Accounting Office's (GAO) April 1998 report on food safety confirms that the Federal government cannot ensure that imported foods are safe.

• Imports pose a special problem. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) lacks authority to "trace back" food borne illness beyond the border. In addition, food imported by FDA fails to meet certain government standards about nearly three times more often than domestically produced food.

• According to GAO, the volume of imported food has doubled over the last five years while the number of FDA inspections has decreased from an estimated 8 percent in fiscal year 1992 to 1.7 percent in fiscal year 1997.

• Thirty-eight percent of the fruits and twelve percent of the vegetables consumed annually by Americans are imported. FDA inspects less than two percent of all imported food shipments. Less than two tenths of one percent of imported fruits and vegetables are tested for microbial contamination. FDA's current tests for the presence of microbes in food can take up to two weeks to produce results. Some microbes have developed mutations that allow them to evade detection.

• According to GAO, "up to 81 million cases of foodborne illnesses and as many as 9,100 deaths from these illnesses occur each year." The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service estimates "the costs for medical treatment and productivity losses associated with these illnesses and deaths range from $6.6 billion to $37.1 billion."

• Foodborne illness is a hazard to all Americans, but more so for our most vulnerable populations. Examples include people living with HIV/AIDS, persons receiving chemotherapy, young children, pregnant women, and the elderly.
• The GAO reported that FDA's procedures for ensuring that unsafe imported foods do not reach consumers are vulnerable to abuse by unscrupulous importers. In some cases, when FDA decides to inspect shipments, the importers have already marketed the goods.

• According to GAO, some importers ignore FDA's orders to return, destroy or re-export their shipments.

• In fiscal year 1997, all of the microbiological samples FDA collected and tested were in response to foodborne illness outbreaks. None were for preventive detection. At present, any attempt by FDA to monitor for the presence of microorganisms would be futile because it lacks adequate tests to detect pathogens on imported food in a timely manner.

• FDA has stated that there is a "critical need for rapid, accurate methods to detect, identify and quantify pathogens. ... the methods for detecting a wide range of bacterial, viral and parasitic pathogens in or on fresh fruits and vegetables are limited...".