Watch What You Eat

When I finally had to buy my dog her food last week, for the first time since the pet food contamination scandal, I actually had to worry about it. And apparently, I need to worry about my own intake as well. The whole thing is due to spiking food with melamine to make it look like it has more protein and more nutritional value than it actually has. And this has been well-known for some time by the FDA. I haven't written about it, but Goldy has:

Months after dogs and cats started dropping dead of renal failure from melamine-tainted pet food, American consumers are beginning to learn how long and how wide this contaminant has also poisoned the human food supply. Last week, as California officials revealed that at least 45 people are known to have eaten tainted pork, the USDA announced that it would pay farmers millions of dollars to destroy and dispose of thousands of hogs fed “salvaged” pet food.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Through the salvaging practice, melamine-tainted pet food has likely contaminated America’s livestock for as long as it has been killing and sickening America’s pets — as far back as August of 2006, or even earlier. And while it may seem alarmist to suggest without absolute proof that Americans have been eating melamine-tainted pork, chicken and farm-raised fish for the better part of a year, the FDA and USDA seem to be preparing to brace Americans for the worst. In an unusual, Saturday afternoon joint press release, the regulators tasked with protecting the safety of our nation’s food supply go to convoluted lengths to reassure the public that eating melamine-tainted pork is perfectly safe.

We don't have a federal food inspection system in this country anymore. We have a federal cover-up of problems with food inspection system. Rick Perlstein calls them E.Coli conservatives. The systematic de-fanging of our regulatory agencies is a legacy of Reagan-Bush conservative rule.