Clinton Upgrades Meat, Poultry Rules

Recalling the muckraking food-industry exposes of almost a century ago, President Clinton on Saturday announced a new system for guarding against deadly bacteria in meat and poultry by relying more on scientific testing and less on the touch, sight and smell of federal inspectors.

The responsibility for designing and implementing the new system--and its eventual cost of perhaps $100 million a year--will fall mainly on private industry. Under the administration’s plan, slaughterhouses and meatpackers will be required to come up with new, scientific methods of preventing contamination.

The president made the announcement during an Independence Day weekend traditionally set aside by families for backyard barbecues of meat and chicken.

“Our families,” Clinton said in his weekly radio address, “ . . . have every right to expect the world’s most bountiful food supply will also be the safest.”

Clinton acknowledged that his administration was shocked into action by the 1993 epidemic of food poisoning in the Pacific Northwest that afflicted 500 people and killed five children after they ate undercooked, contaminated hamburgers bearing a strain of E. coli bacteria. As he spoke, the president was flanked by several parents of children who died in the 1993 outbreak.

In a similar way, President Theodore Roosevelt was shocked into action in 1906 by a best-selling novel, Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle,” which exposed hazardous and noxious conditions in Chicago’s stockyards and meatpacking industry. The national outrage led to the first pure-food laws and the federal meat inspection system.

Alluding to that historical episode, Clinton said: “For all our technological advances, the way we inspect meat and poultry had not changed in 90 years. Even though we know that killers like salmonella can only be seen with a microscope, inspectors were still checking on meat and poultry by look, touch, smell.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that as many as 4,000 deaths and 10 million illnesses result annually from the consumption of meat and poultry contaminated by E. coli, salmonella and other pathogens. Most cases are caused by bacteria from animals’ intestines, which can inadvertently mix with meat during slaughter or processing.

Clinton said the new inspection system will have three main components that will be phased into operation in the next few months:

* Meatpackers: “We’re challenging every meatpacking plant in America to do scientific tests or take other safety precautions at every step of production,” Clinton said. Meeting the challenge, however, will not be voluntary. Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman told reporters Saturday that his inspectors must approve each plant’s program and verify its effectiveness. Plants that fail to implement a satisfactory program could be penalized and even closed down, he said.

* Slaughterhouses: “We’re insisting,” Clinton said, “that every slaughterhouse begin to conduct rigorous scientific tests to make sure the meat is not contaminated with deadly strains of E. coli and salmonella bacteria.” The two bacteria are classified as pathogens, a scientific term for microorganisms that cause disease.

* All plants dealing with meat and poultry: “Companies will have to improve their sanitation procedures,” the president said. “All too often, food is contaminated because simple sanitary rules are not followed.”

Under the current meat safety system, more than 7,400 Food Safety and Inspection Service inspectors monitor 6,200 slaughterhouses and processing plants in the United States, where they look for diseased animals or contaminated carcasses with so-called organoleptic methods--a fancy term for what amounts to looking at, touching and smelling the meat.

The heart of the new system is called Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points, or HACCP, which industry insiders pronounce “hassip.” Under this program, companies must identify the points in their production processes most likely to lead to contamination and create acceptable plans for preventing it. A similar approach was initiated last December for seafood.

Also, companies will for the first time have to submit meat samples to the Agriculture Department to prove that salmonella levels do not exceed federally determined limits.

Salmonella testing will start in September, officials said, and other aspects of the plan will be phased in during the next six to 18 months. Smaller plants, accounting for less than one-quarter of the nation’s meat supply, will have as long as 42 months to fully comply.

The new program was hailed immediately by Dr. Fernando Trevino, executive director of the American Public Health Assn. Trevino called it “a break from the past” that “places human health first when it comes to regulating the food-borne pathogens. . . .”

Restaurant officials also welcomed the new rules. They said that while many leading meat companies have employed more stringent safeguards than even those announced by Clinton, many of their cohorts needed prodding.

David Theno, vice president for quality assurance and product safety for San Diego-based Jack-in-the-Box, said, “It will help the rest of the industry catch up to where the top guys, the leaders, have been for some time.”

Glickman, while noting that the new rules had been worked out after consultation with members of the meat industry, acknowledged that there had been “differences of perspective.”

“This is a science-based system and we think it’s a step forward,” said Kenneth N. May, technical advisor for the National Broiler Council, which represents 95% of U.S. poultry producers.

But May emphasized that the new system would not remove all risks; there is always a chance of contamination associated with raw meat, he said. In addition, he pointed out that consumers still must carefully follow cooking and handling instructions, a point also made by Clinton.

At Service Packing Co. in Vernon, Calif., a supervisor said reputable meat plants had instituted changes such as those announced by Clinton long ago. “A lot of the big companies are already doing it. This is just a way for the USDA to justify themselves; it’s politics,” said the supervisor, who did not want to be identified.

At Service Packing, the supervisor said, officials test meat samples for E. coli and salmonella in an on-site laboratory before sending out the samples to a second lab for confirmation. That procedure has been in place for at least two years, the supervisor said.

“If it tests positive, everything in the lot [from which the sample is taken] is held and it’s sent back,” the supervisor said, adding that samples “rarely” test positive.

Nelson Warfield, press secretary for Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole, offered an even less charitable assessment.

“As usual, Bill Clinton’s past raises questions about his credibility--even on an issue as nonpartisan as food safety,” Warfield said. “After waiting three years to take action, Bill Clinton today did not explain how his election year ‘get tough with the meat industry’ attitude squares with his old ‘easy come, easy go’ treatment of the same industry in Arkansas.

“After all, Clinton’s coddling of chicken and pork producers in Arkansas left more than half the streams in his home state too polluted for drinking, swimming or fishing,” Warfield said.

Agriculture Department officials said the new system’s cost to the industry would be about a tenth of a cent per pound, or about $100 million a year, after initial implementation costs of about $350 million.

In return, said Michael R. Taylor, administrator of the Food Safety and Inspection Service, who also is acting agriculture undersecretary for food safety, the country will save between $1 billion and $4 billion a year in medical expenses, lost work and other costs of food-borne illness.

The cost to the government will be nil, officials said, although meat inspectors will have to be trained in some new practices.

Glickman stressed that federal inspectors, even while supervising the scientific testing, will continue to check meat and poultry with their old-fashioned methods.

“We will continue to look, smell, feel and touch because the human factor cannot be ignored in the inspection process,” he said. “But it will be augmented by the science standards and made more realistic and practical and efficient.”

Times staff writers Jeff Brazil and Daniel P. Puzo in Los Angeles and wire services contributed to this story.

The Plan’s Impact

How the government’s new plan to improve the safety of meat and poultry is expected to impact processors and consumers:

* Each plant must put in place plans, including increased scientific testing and stricter sanitation procedures, to eliminate hazards from E. coli, salmonella and other bacteria. The government will act as a monitor.

* Large establishments will have 18 months to comply. Federal officials say those firms account for 3/4 of slaughter production. Smaller firms will have more time.

* Federal officials say the new system’s cost will be about a tenth of a cent per pound sold, or about $100 million each year after implementation costs.

* Public health benefits, including reductions in medical costs and lost work time due to illness, are estimated at $1 billion to $4 billion a year.