Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions

CONGRESSIONAL RECORD
SENATE
Oct. 7, 2004

STATEMENTS ON INTRODUCED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS

By Mr. DURBIN:

S. 2910. A bill to establish the Food Safety Administration to protect the public health by preventing food-borne illness, ensuring the safety of food intended for human consumption, improving research on contaminants leading to food-borne illness, and improving security of food from intentional contamination; to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, when Americans sit down at the dinner table, their confidence in the safety of the food they are eating is based in part on the knowledge that the Federal Government is working hard to ensure their food is not contaminate. Right now, our food is the safest in the world, but there are widening gaps in our food safety net due to emerging threats and the fact that food safety oversight has evolved over time to spread over several government agencies. This mismatched, piecemeal approach to food safety could spell disaster if we do not act quickly and decisively.

A single food safety agency with authority based on sound scientific principles would provide this country with the greatest hope of reducing foodborne illnesses and preparing for a bioterrorist attack on our food supply.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that as many as 76 million people suffer from food poisoning each year. Of those individuals, approximately 325,000 will be hospitalized, and more than 5,000 will die. Factors such as emerging pathogens, an aging population at high risk for foodborne illnesses, an increasing volume of food imports, and people eating outside their homes more often underscore the need for us to take charge and shed the old bureaucratic shackles that have tied us to the overlapping and inefficient ad hoc food safety system of the past.

I rise today to introduce the Safe Food Act of 2004. This legislation would create a single, independent Federal food safety agency to administer all aspects of Federal food safety inspections, enforcement, standards-setting and research in order to protect public health. The components of the agencies now charged with protecting the food supply, primarily housed at the Food and Drug Administration and the Agriculture Department, would be transferred to this new agency.

The new Food Safety Administrator would be responsible for the safety of the food supply and would carry out that charge by implementing the registration and recordkeeping requirements of the Bioterrorism Act of 2002; ensuring slaughterhouses and food processing plants have procedures in place to prevent and reduce food contamination; regularly inspecting domestic food facilities, with inspection frequency based on risk; and centralizing the authority to detain, seize, condemn and recall food that is adulterated or misbranded. The Administrator would be charged with requiring food producers to make it possible for their products to be traced in the event of a foodborne illness outbreak in order to minimize the health impact of such an event.

The Administrator would also have the power to examine the food safety practices of foreign countries and work with the states to enforce food safety laws, including the ability to seek various civil and criminal penalties for serious violations of the food safety laws. The Administrator would also actively oversee public education and research programs on foodborne illness.

In this era of limited budgets, it is our responsibility to streamline the Federal food safety system. The United States simply cannot afford to continue operating multiple redundant systems. This is not about more regulation, a super agency, or increased bureaucracy. It is about common sense and the more effective marshaling of our existing resources.

I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this important piece of legislation.