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FDA Lifts Tomatoes Salmonella Warning

huffingtonpost.com — The U.S. government has declared it's OK to eat tomatoes again, lifting its salmonella warning amid signs that the outbreak _ while not over _ may finally be slowing.

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  • seltaeb4, on 07/17/2008, -2/+26The FDA has now announced that tomatoes are safe...

    ...almost exactly as they did NOT announce when tomatoes had become unsafe, the FDA's resources being stretched so thinly that they can't do the job they were chartered to do [protect the nation's food supply]—

    So, we're back to their OLD notification system, where it only becomes news when enough Americans simultaneously puke and die that the FDA must issue a press release on the situation.


    • vtron, on 07/18/2008, -0/+41220 people have gotten sick since April 10. Who gives a *****?

      I completely agree that something should only become an issue when it effects enough people. If one person eats Taco Bell and gets sick, they shouldn't shut down the franchise to find out why.
    • nittanylion06, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3seriously, who cares? My tomato eating habits never changed. More people were involved in car accidents in the time it took these people to get sick / die. Still waiting on a car recall...

      /life is dangerous
  • whatknight, on 07/17/2008, -1/+26but now jalapeños are unsafe.
    • borez, on 07/18/2008, -0/+7They've always been unsafe
    • itsthebrod, on 07/18/2008, -3/+4About as safe as anything from Mexico... Quality assurance is something that country isn't known for.
      • Bluezdood, on 07/18/2008, -0/+1So true. I've been very careful as to the products I use from that country in particular, especially produce.
  • Buglady, on 07/17/2008, -1/+18Meanwhile, the FDA web site, updated this afternoon, still carries the same warning against consuming certain varieties of tomatoes unless they originated in one of the "safe" growing areas. Wish they could agree on a consistent message and get it out to consumers in an effective manner.

    Check eFoodAlert.blogspot.com for commentary and current news.
  • PMG2007, on 07/18/2008, -0/+13That's nice even though like my whole family got sick with it. It was like the worst thing ever. Beyond the flu.
    • ho0ber, on 07/18/2008, -8/+1Your family needs to eat fewer raw vegetables.
  • akpwnz, on 07/18/2008, -0/+22I've been eating them the whole time. The people at subway said "eat at your own risk" so I kept gobbling them down.
  • sogeshirts, on 07/18/2008, -3/+13The FDA is an awful disgrace of an organization.
    • itsthebrod, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3I thought FEMA already has that trademarked?
    • Charlesbian, on 07/18/2008, -1/+1do you know how ***** hard it is to trace these outbreaks. some of the smartest, most inquisitive people i know work for the CDC and even they don't always get it right.
  • jcorn1, on 07/18/2008, -0/+11Whew! Guess I can stop using my home-grown ones...or...wait..maybe not.
  • AmyVernon, on 07/18/2008, -0/+16remember when you could only get salmonella from raw eggs or chicken? sigh. those were the days.
  • Tatango, on 07/18/2008, -2/+8All veggies have something bad in them! Eat garlic
  • ToeCracker, on 07/18/2008, -1/+8There's so much poison in food anyway, it's good this one is over however there will be some other outbreak around the corner.
  • hep2djive, on 07/18/2008, -0/+10Yea!!! BLT
  • kavutu, on 07/18/2008, -0/+9All our food is safe to eat. Just do not swallow it!!!
  • bmph8ter, on 07/18/2008, -0/+7Yeaaaa!! Of course it didn't hurt me much, as the tomatoes in my garden are doing quite well.
  • danzarrella, on 07/18/2008, -0/+6the ban actually led to a few funny situations are restaurants, esp with people "willing to take the risk"
  • WriterSD, on 07/18/2008, -2/+5Ugh, I hate tomatoes. Too bad. :(
  • Jasper710, on 07/18/2008, -2/+6I HATE EVERYONE OF YOU. JUST EAT. YOU KNOW YOU'RE GONNA EAT IT!
  • DigSomeMore, on 07/18/2008, -1/+17FDA put alot of growers out of business because of their blanket ban...
  • xptweakerntn, on 07/18/2008, -8/+2I have heard someone say that this was a terrorist attack. I remember back right after 9/11, people were talking about terrorists potentially hitting our food, and I just found this interesting. If it were, I figured they would give credit, this potentially causing panic, causing people to stop purchasing food, etc etc. I guess we can't put everything on their arms, but it is just a though. By the way, when was the LAST time "tomatoes" were carrying salmonella?
    • Buglady, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3There have been at least a dozen Salmonella outbreaks that were definitively traced to tomatoes (some grown in the US and some in Mexico) over the last 10-15 years.

  • easypie, on 07/18/2008, -5/+0Yikes! theres a salmonella in your tomato.
    WHAT THE...?
    oh ok ! its a salmonella. Cute.
  • bubba9999, on 07/18/2008, -0/+7I'd be pissed if I were a tomato grower. Talk about putting a dent in an industry. I just hope they were able to sell them to canneries or something and offset their losses a bit.
  • filmbandit, on 07/18/2008, -0/+4in other news,

    the pigs and chickens are getting blossom end rot.

  • lajaw, on 07/18/2008, -3/+14This article is newsworthy, but why can't it come from a different source than huffinitpost? You socialists on digg are driving huge traffic to that leftist rag. Proof positive that the left is nothing more than drones. You should expand your horizons and read other NEWS sites. Huffinitpost is an opinion site. Not a news site.
  • koft, on 07/18/2008, -1/+5It was never unsafe to eat any of these foods anyway. All you have to do is wash the ***** before you eat it. A lot of these problems would go away if people would just source their food locally instead of expecting a tomato to be shipped half way around the world.
    • cobophers, on 07/18/2008, -1/+3That is untrue, salmonella crawls into the stomata of the plant. This is why washed food as a precaution would fail. But don't take it from me, I listened to Michael Osterholm discuss what the real problems are: 1. Surveillance 2. FDA Reaction 3. Non-Irradiated Products
      • Charlesbian, on 07/18/2008, -1/+2+1 to cobophers. don't feel superior to people koft until u have all the facts.
      • koft, on 07/18/2008, -0/+2It's not untrue. Yes, salmonella can get inside produce and theres not much you can do about that. The stuff is grown outside where bugs and animals relieve themselves on it not to mention it's common to use animal waste as fertilizer. Michael Osterholm outright said the individual risk was negligible. His estimate was 30k people got sick out of 3 billion servings of tomatoes. And we don't even know that the tomatoes were the problem.

        Food born illness is a common problem mainly because people aren't washing their produce. Or they're doing stupid stuff like slicing up pork on a cutting board and then slicing produce on the same cutting board. You can get rid of 90% of the bacteria on produce by just washing in plain water. What does the FDA say you can do to reduce catching salmonella from produce to restaurants and consumers? Wash it. That's what Michael Osterholm says too. Wash your damn food before you prepare it.
  • John370, on 07/18/2008, -3/+6This is *****! You watch, some company is going to get "FDA Approval" to spray all of our vegetables with some new chemical, deeming them "safe for human consumption". Vegetables don't have salmonella unless some ***** put it there, to scare us enough to pass some new law which allows more ***** with the FDA and a chemical plant to line their pockets!!

    ***** the FDA, it's time American's wake the ***** up, and realize the only way you are safe is by knowing how corrupt it is and not letting those greedy bastards pull the wool over your eyes any longer!!

    • OMGWTFROFLMAOx2, on 07/18/2008, -2/+1you're an idiot
      • John370, on 07/18/2008, -1/+3And what evidence substantiates your claim that I have no idea what I am talking about, and am in fact an idiot?

        Unless you have something to add to the conversation or any proof to the contrary of my statement, you should take your name calling back to the kiddy playground or back under whatever rock you crawled out from. To simply put someone down without rebuttle makes you look childish, spineless and incompetent.
    • dagnome1984, on 07/18/2008, -0/+1FDA gives us the illusion of safety. People in search of a profit is why these cases of food contamination are so rare. What farmer would want their customers dead? You see there is already a built in check on the system.
  • Rudegar, on 07/18/2008, -0/+7nice! chicken sushi is just not the same without tomato's
  • str3ama, on 07/18/2008, -1/+5jalepeno peppers still shouldn't be bought because the FDA still has no clue on whether they're safe or not.
    • John370, on 07/18/2008, -1/+1Yup, until the grower's of Jalapeno peppers pay the FDA enough money to run a press release stating that they are now safe too.
      • devilsh, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3We all know that the jalapeno cartel one of the largest unknown crime organized organizations there is. In fact, the bosses of the tomato cartel report to them. They are a hot bunch....Jalapenos will be marked safe as soon as the money bag is dropped off in the park behind the fountain of the kid peeing...



        What an amazing lack of knowledge you display here... now bow down to your mexican overlords...
  • brock2020, on 07/18/2008, -0/+5I just want my bruschetta back!
  • aserer511, on 07/18/2008, -0/+4Attack of The Killer Tomatoes 2 production halted
  • salamnder, on 07/18/2008, -0/+7I am just sick of this news source. I am sick of the current model of the news agency... Pick a slant and run with it... You have oberman (and all of msnbc, most of cnn), huffington, rawstory etc on one side and rush, hannity and combs (and all of fox news) on the other. Can't they just give facts? I know that everything will have some sort of bias but there are ways to actually report unbiased, true news that the populous can then make up their own mind and not just join the side that they mostly relate to and then not doing any critical thinking of their own.
    /end rant
  • Cheeseburgers, on 07/18/2008, -6/+2toh-may-toze!? boil 'em, mash 'em, stick 'em in a stew!
    toh-may-toze!
    toh-may-toze!
  • liuite, on 07/18/2008, -0/+6i am going to take probiotics daily and stop worrying about what produce i can't eat without getting sick
  • Aanidaani, on 07/18/2008, -1/+7Next it'll be onions that are arbitrarily taken off the market for some random period of time -- then cucumbers, then lettuce, etc. This is almost as bad as the DHS's terrorist threat level colors...
  • crussell96, on 07/18/2008, -0/+5I once knew a guy named Sal Manella. No Joke.
  • Loadedforbear, on 07/18/2008, -2/+0Just play "Puberty Love" while eating your salad and all tomatos will be rendered harmless.
  • bigp3rm, on 07/18/2008, -0/+5Because the FDA doesn't know what the ***** it's doing. The tomato industry lost $250,000,000. And now we will be suck with higher prices on goods that use tomatoes.
  • lajaw, on 07/18/2008, -1/+5Try this link. It has no leftist tilt.

    http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080717/D91VTCU80 ...
    • itsthebrod, on 07/18/2008, -0/+1How is that story any different?
    • VitriolAndAngst, on 07/18/2008, -0/+2Truth has a well-known Liberal bias.
    • raquel9e, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3It's the exact same AP story.
      • VitriolAndAngst, on 07/18/2008, -1/+2...AP has a Moony bias. How'd they cover this story?
      • lajaw, on 07/18/2008, -2/+1But isn't from huffinitpost. This is the Original.
  • endgame, on 07/18/2008, -1/+5The FDA is like FEMA, another worthless Government agency.
    • Charlesbian, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3Have you tried tracking outbreaks yourself? It's probably one of the hardest jobs to have. You have to coordinate sociology and biology to find something that could be ANYWHERE. Do you think the FDA can just pick a tomato off the shelf and find out where the outbreak is? Most of the time they are playing catchup with the disease, backtracking the infected people, who don't know when or where exactly they ate the foul tomato.
    • VitriolAndAngst, on 07/18/2008, -0/+1Made so by crooks.

      It used to be the envy of the world. Government doesn't have to fail at these things.

      Start prefacing "Government" with "Republican policies for" and this will make sense.
  • endgame, on 07/18/2008, -2/+5STOP buying our food from MEXICO & CHINA!
  • Idiggapony, on 07/18/2008, -0/+5Well this is good news. But why is a left wing attack site the best place for us to learn about tomatoes?

  • tufftugg, on 07/18/2008, -2/+1 So, under Mr.Bush the American government grew by 60% and the debt into the roof. So, why is FDA so inept now, they use to track things down right away. Maybe another indicator of how inept this Administration is?
    • OMGWTFROFLMAOx2, on 07/18/2008, -0/+1you don't understand how funding works do you
  • Charlesbian, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3ill say it again

    Have you tried tracking outbreaks yourself? It's probably one of the hardest jobs to have. You have to coordinate sociology and biology to find something that could be ANYWHERE. Do you think the FDA can just pick a tomato off the shelf and find out where the outbreak is? Most of the time they are playing catchup with the disease, backtracking the infected people, who don't know when or where exactly they ate the foul tomato.
    • VitriolAndAngst, on 07/18/2008, -0/+2You also have to track and inspect the food that gets shipped in or goes to market like we USED to do, when sources of outbreaks were found within hours.

      They are playing catchup because they have no data to begin with. It's an impossible task for the handful of inspectors who are lucky enough to visit a food processing plant ONCE in ten years -- with prior warning, of course. The system is broken and THIS is what it looks like. Save a few pennies on oversight while losing an industry to a skeptical consumer market.
    • devilsh, on 07/18/2008, -0/+2Correct. Unlike the Earthbound Spinach outbreak from two years ago; where they were able to locate the source and supplier of the tainted spinach, commodities like tomatoes don't have traceback controls built in. A tomato can pass through a dozen hands before getting to market. The industry should step forward like it did for leafy greens. Making people ill is bad for business.
  • forgottenhope, on 07/18/2008, -0/+4Can we get a color chart for how safe it is to eat food on a given day? Similar to the Department of homeland security color chart to show how scared i need to be of boogymen today.
  • VitriolAndAngst, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3Wow. They didn't find the source of the outbreak, but they know the carnage is slowing because of fewer hospital visits.

    It's like not finding the shark but seeing fewer bodies floating in the water. Sounds like we don't have enough lifeguards at the FDA.
  • fromaworld, on 07/18/2008, -1/+3First Huffington Post article I've ever dugg.

    Wow. A story actually based on facts instead of speculation? What is this world coming to?!?
  • VitriolAndAngst, on 07/18/2008, -0/+4What makes me most angry, are the comments like; "What do you expect of a Government agency" as if it wasn't the lobbying of Corporations to put a fox in charge of the hen house in the first place.

    The FDA used to do a damn good job. We took if for granted. Some people think "great, government is shrinking" because fewer inspectors, and lower wages for people who do oversight at FDA, CDC, EPA and pick an initial.

    I remember listening to stories of the book shelves being auctioned off at the EPA in order to destroy the libraries they use to keep track of the history of various corporations. You cannot have oversight on a companies output on 7/18/2008 if you don't know what they were outputting in 2002 when they were shipping less product.

    This is NOT a failure of Government. That's like saying, LUNGS are no good because they fail after breathing smog and cigarettes for thirty years. You have to get rid of the corruption and clean up the system. We are going to have government as long as we have lungs and lots of people --- so get used to the fact, and grow up and say; "what sort of government do we want?" The answer should be; "One that works for my interests."

    Billions of dollars have been spent to make so many Americans believe that their interests are aligned with Donald Trump, or the consortium of interconnected, global corporations that own GM, the media or our military.

    The military dumps tons of the most toxic chemicals on earth, and have been for years. ADM and Monsanto are making a lot of profits with the current food system we have. The spinach or tomato industries might collapse, because of lack of faith -- but the big cats will still make money because people cannot boycott eating.

    It's all the same problem. People who been talking about the lack of food inspection, regulation, and controlling what we import into our country (hint, the imports make local farmers weaker and then a mega-corp can take them over -- our distributors DON'T care where we get our food, as long as THEY get all the profits). Same reason Ford and GM are moving their plants overseas -- no healthcare costs, cheap labor, and getting to break unions.

    Who is going to buy these tainted tomatoes, and imported cars in the future, I wonder?

    I'm going to start buying through a local farm co-op and I suggest everyone else do the same. Oh, and get a bicycle and some chicken wire for a fence -- you will thank me later. These greedy b@stards are going to squeeze us too hard, and we are going to find a way around them.
  • Coolkid11, on 07/18/2008, -1/+3This is why we should grow in the U.S. and process the food in the U.S. We shouldn't grow in the U.S. and have processed or China or simply just import it from Mexico. The problem though is that there are so many regulations and unions and other ***** laws that just make it more economical for farmers to ship their food halfway around the world only to be shipped halfway back to the market.
  • badjoke, on 07/18/2008, -0/+3I've loved this tomato shortage, seeing as how I can't stand them in their raw form. No more saying "-and no tomatoes" for sandwiches and burgers was great.
  • bffoley, on 07/18/2008, -0/+1We should just ban tomatoes to be safe. That way, I dont have to say "No tomatoes" when I order a burger.
  • unfairunbalance, on 07/18/2008, -0/+0Government induced tomato shortage. Beta test for creating food shortages for population control.
  • soniyashrma, on 07/19/2008, -0/+1Thats awesome
  •  

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