Clean Food, or Irradiated Dirty Food?
Clean food, or irradiated dirty food?
excerpted from the book
Corporate Predators
by Russel Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
Common Courage Press, 1999
The irradiation industry is betting that consumers will settle
for the latter.
Earlier this month, in response to a petition filed by Isomedix,
a New Jersey radiation firm, the Food and Drug Administration
(FDA) authorized the use of irradiation-a process by which food
is exposed to high levels of nuclear radiation-for meat products
including beef, lamb and pork. Irradiation is already permitted
in the United States for poultry. Irradiation kills significant
numbers of micro-organisms, such as e. coli.
Companies like Isomedix are hoping to ride the wave of justified
public concern over outbreaks of e. coli and other food contaminants
to overcome consumer resistance to the controversial irradiation
process. Public opinion polls show three quarters of the population
oppose irradiation and would refuse to eat irradiated food.
There are sound reasons underlying consumer resistance to
irradiation.
First, although the FDA has approved the use of irradiation,
there are serious uncertainties surrounding the safety of irradiated
foods. "No long-term studies on the safety of eating irradiated
beef have been conducted, and the effects on humans are unknown,"
notes Michael Colby, executive director of Food & Water, Inc.,
a Vermont-based food safety organization that is the leading opponent
of food irradiation.
Second, irradiation kills "good" as well as "bad"
bacteria. That means if beef becomes contaminated after irradiation,
dangerous bacteria will be free to multiply without competition
from harmless bacteria.
Third, irradiation fails to deal with the real food safety
problem: unhealthy conditions on animal farms and in slaughter-houses
and packing-houses. In the last two decades, the meat and poultry
industries have become tremendously concentrated, with each sector
dominated by a handful of giants like ConAgra, Carrel, Prod and
Tyson. These companies buy animals raised on "factory farms,"
where the animals are confined to small spaces in which bacteria
can easily spread. The animals are transported to increasingly
mechanized slaughterhouses and processing plants, where feces
routinely spill or spray on meat, and chicken carcasses are dipped
in cold water tanks contaminated with fecal material. Animals
pass by workers on the corporate assembly lines at staggering
speeds-often too fast for the workers to maintain proper sanitation
standards, or even to identify contaminants on meat or poultry.
Genuinely ensuring a safe food supply requires addressing these
conditions so that animals are raised, slaughtered and processed
in sanitary conditions.
There are other reasons to reject irradiation. At existing
irradiation facilities (which overwhelmingly sterilize products
like medical equipment rather than food), there is already a disturbing
record of worker overexposure to nuclear radiation and of improper
disposal of radioactive waste.
Fortunately, the FDA's approval of irradiation for beef does
not mean it must be widely used. If consumers reject the technology,
it will not gain a foothold in the market.
Under the innovative leadership of Food & Water, Inc.,
consumers so far have done exactly that. Although it has urged
the government not to permit irradiation, Food & Water's emphasis
has been on directing consumer pressure to food suppliers-from
McDonnell's to Hormel (makers of Pam) to supermarket chains-and
extracting commitments that they will not sell irradiated food
products. That strategy has succeeded so far, and there is good
reason to believe it will continue to keep irradiated food off
of supermarket shelves and out of fast-food kitchens.
The solution to the problem of dirty and contaminated meat
and poultry is to clean up the beef, pork and poultry farms and
the factories in which animals are slaughtered and
processed-not to expose the food to nuclear radiation. That's
the message consumers must send to the beef, pork and poultry
companies, supermarkets, restaurant chains and other big food
distributors.
Corporate Predators