FEED - July 2008
Contents
- Sensible alternatives to pharma food crops
- Tomato scare highlights "broken" food system
- Iowa floods worsened by farming practices
- Fumes from massive dairy force families to evacuate
- First study finds MRSA in U.S. pigs
1.Sensible alternatives to pharma food crops
Biotech drugs can be very beneficial, but when they are produced in genetically engineered food crops grown outdoors, the risk of contaminating the food supply is too great. The Union of Concerned Scientists has unveiled a new online slideshow featuring safer alternatives. The innovative companies and researchers we profile are developing needed drugs while keeping them off the public's dinner plates, using engineered carrot cells, duckweed plants, fungi, and greenhouse-grown tobacco. The existence of these safer alternatives adds credence to our call for the U.S. Department of Agriculture to ban outdoor pharma food crop production in the new rules the agency is expected to release this summer. View the slideshow here—and visit our Protect Our Food campaign to learn more about taking the harm out of pharma crops!
2. Tomato scare highlights "broken" food system
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is still struggling to find the cause of a Salmonella outbreak that has sickened at least 550 people in 33 states since April. Tomatoes are the prime suspect, and restaurants nationwide have swept them off the menu while the FDA investigates. The agency also is examining other foods commonly eaten with tomatoes. The widespread nature of the illnesses points to an inherent weakness of our industrial food production system: When production is centralized and fresh food travels thousands of miles, contamination can spread farther and faster. In contrast, distribution and consumption of food near where it was grown tend to keep outbreaks of foodborne illness localized. The FDA is looking as far as Mexico for the source of the latest outbreak. Read the FDA's latest update, or read more from The Washington Post.
| "The FDA has said that local and homegrown tomatoes are unaffected by the current Salmonella outbreak. Shopping at farmers' markets for produce grown close to home is one way consumers can reduce their risk of foodborne illness." ~UCS Senior Analyst Karen Perry Stillerman |
3. Iowa floods worsened by farming practices
Towns and fields in Iowa were inundated after record rainfall this spring. This weather pattern is termed a 500-year flood, though some experts say that global warming may be causing it to occur more frequently. There is also evidence that agricultural practices that predominate today have worsened the impact of the flooding by removing some of the landscape's resiliency to floods. Planting crops close to waterways, straightening river courses, replacing deep-rooted prairie grasses with shallow-rooted corn, and draining wetlands are among the practices that reduce the land's ability to hold water and lead to more devastating floods, according to an article in The Washington Post.
4. Fumes from massive dairy force families to evacuate
A toxic gas called hydrogen sulfide emanating from a Minnesota dairy operation forced some local residents to leave their homes for several days. The gas was generated by low-oxygen conditions in manure pits in a massive CAFO (confined animal feeding operation) in Marshall County. These conditions do not typically occur in animal operations that use hoop barns or that spread animals out on pasture. Hydrogen sulfide, along with ammonia, is one of the most commonly produced harmful gases from CAFOs. Monitors on the dairy CAFO in Marshall County detected levels of 90 parts per billion of hydrogen sulfide; levels as low as 7 parts per billion can provoke symptoms, according to at least one study. Residents who live near the dairy have reported symptoms like nausea, vomiting, and headaches. Read more from Minnesota Public Radio, or read CAFOs Uncovered to learn more about CAFOs.
| "CAFO practices create costly messes that society is stuck paying for. Fortunately there is a growing movement among U.S. farmers to embrace 'smart pasture operations' and other modern farming practices that can provide plentiful meat, dairy, and eggs without causing the problems that CAFOs do." ~Doug Gurian-Sherman, UCS Senior Scientist and author of CAFOs Uncovered |
5. First study finds MRSA in U.S. pigs
Scientists from the University of Iowa have conducted the first test of U.S. swine for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), the bacterium responsible for more U.S. deaths than AIDS. Of the 200 pigs the team tested, 70 percent carried a strain of MRSA, ST398, that is known to affect humans. The scientists found that almost half of 20 workers on local pig farms carried the same strain of MRSA, suggesting a route to the wider community. So far no one has tested MRSA patients in U.S. hospitals to identify whether they carry the strain. The federal government is testing meat (but not livestock) for MRSA, but hasn't released its results. In the United Kingdom, at least three people are known to have contracted the ST398 strain, and experts are speculating that they probably contracted it from handling or eating meat. Read more from the Seattle Post Intelligencer.
| "The recent wave of MRSA-related illnesses and deaths among otherwise healthy students and athletes is very troubling. We need to determine as soon as possible whether some of those illnesses and deaths are traceable to the overuse of antibiotics on swine farms." ~Margaret Mellon, director of UCS's Food and Environment Program |
