Back Seat for Food Safety?

It is evident that producing a safe product is more expensive than producing a dangerous one. Regulation by government can be costly, both to taxpayers who pay for the regulators and to companies that must comply. So it is no surprise that meat producers are vigorously resisting the stringent, new guidelines of the Department of Agriculture for meat inspection and safety. These rules would impose additional costs on meat and poultry packers and they might, as the industry contends, result in higher prices to consumers. But just as their cost is obvious, so too is the need for them.

The current meat inspection system, relying on a historically shorthanded cadre of inspectors who feel, smell and view animal and bird carcasses for signs of contamination, has proven inadequate to the task. The problem is not just insufficient staff; existing inspection techniques simply cannot detect microbes, including salmonella and E. coli bacteria, that have sickened and even killed unsuspecting consumers. In 1993, hamburger meat contaminated with E. coli was responsible for an outbreak of food poisoning in the Northeast that killed two children and made hundreds sick. In the last 10 years, bacteria-contaminated meat has killed more than 100 people and caused more than 100,000 illnesses.

The new rules would require meat and poultry packers to use microscopes to test samples for bacteria and to use special rinses and temperature controls. These rules are both reasonable and long overdue. The period for public comment on the draft rules ended Monday, and now the department hopes to issue final regulations by year’s end.

But even rules on something as fundamental as the safety of the food we eat are grist for anti-regulatory zealots in Congress. If it becomes law, a House-passed one-year freeze on new regulations will block the meat rules. The Senate passed a weaker regulatory reform bill; conference committee action is pending. Another bill, passed by the House and pending in the Senate, would require elaborate cost-benefit studies of any proposed rules.

President Clinton’s signature, of course, is needed for either the one-year freeze or the cost-benefit notion to become law. The meat safety rules are yet another reason he should withhold it.