FDA Issues One-Year Progress Report on Implementation of Food Protection Plan

The Plan outlines strategies for prevention, intervention and response, and is designed to address food safety and food defense for both domestic and imported products. It covers the full lifecycle of food. (See ITT's Online Archives or 11/14/07 news, 07111415, for BP summary of the Food Protection Plan.)

Highlights of FDA Implementation of Food Protection Plan

The FDA highlights its accomplishments in implementing the Food Protection Plan's three core strategies of prevention of outbreaks of food-borne disease, and intervention and response if they occur, including the following (partial list):

Prevention

To prevent outbreaks of food-borne disease, the FDA:

established offices in five regions that export food and other FDA-regulated products to the U.S.: China, India, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East;

was part of a Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) delegation to China to address food safety issues in both countries, in which U.S. and Chinese government officials discussed the recent outbreak of foodborne illness in the U.S. related to fresh produce as well as the melamine contamination of dairy products in China;

held a meeting with more than 200 federal, state, local, tribal and territorial partners to address the challenges of protecting the nation's food supply;

approved the use of irradiation of iceberg lettuce and spinach for the control of pathogens, such as Escherichia coli O157:H7, in or on those foods;

developed methods to detect melamine and cyanuric acid in feed and feed ingredients; and

is using genetic analysis to identify hundreds of Salmonella strains from seafood imports, which provides information to trace outbreaks of Salmonella to the FDA to implement surveillance programs to ensure food safety.

Intervention

To intervene in cases where outbreaks occur, the FDA:

completed inspections of 5,930 high-risk domestic food establishments during fiscal year 2008;

initiated a targeted, risk-based inspection of a canning facility in 2008 identified cans with viable Clostridium botulinum spores and a recall;

increased inspection efforts to ensure that manufacturers of all types of low acid canned food products are adhering to applicable FDA requirements, which illustrate the need for companies to operate under adequate preventive control systems;

issued its draft guidance on voluntary third-party certification programs for food and feed (See ITT's Online Archives or 07/14/08 news, 08071410, for BP summary); and

is expanding its database of adverse drug events to include adverse feed events, which will allow the agency to respond faster to outbreaks of feedborne disease in animals, contamination episodes, and/or product defects.

Response

In response to outbreaks, the FDA:

is working with industry and the public to identify best practices for tracing fresh produce throughout the supply chain;

canvassed over 2,100 vendors of Asian products to remove any Chinese infant formula from the market and to sample milk-derived Chinese products to check for melamine contamination, and provided regular updates on its Web site, advising consumers which products to avoid because of melamine contamination; and

held regular briefing calls for consumer organizations during the outbreak of Salmonella Saintpaul in the summer of 2008, and regularly updated a Web page that provided information on the investigation into the outbreak.

(See ITT's Online Archives or 07/09/08 new, 08070906, for BP summary of FDA's six-month summary of its progress in implementing the Plan.)

FDA press release (dated 12/01/08) available at http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/NEWS/2008/NEW01917.html

FDA report (dated December 2008) available at www.fda.gov/oc/initiatives/advance/food/progressreport1108.html