Beef Up E. coli Testing

You shouldn’t have to worry about your burger making you sick.  After a rough year for ground beef in 2009, we’ve already seen hundreds of thousands of pounds of beef recalled in 2010. That’s why it’s crucial for Congress to close dangerous loopholes in USDA’s testing program. Tell your senators its time to beef up E. coli testing.

Right now, there are serious flaws in the way USDA tests for E. coli, which must be addressed to prevent future outbreaks. The agency tests for contamination at processing plants, but then fails to investigate the source of contamination. As a result of this flawed process, the wrong plants are blamed and the agency misses an opportunity to stop contaminated beef from reaching consumers.

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand from New York has introduced a bill that will improve our E. coli testing. The bill will require large slaughterhouses to test products they are sending to other plants for processing, encourage more testing and reporting all the way through the supply chain, and force USDA to investigate back to the source when they find contamination.

Can you tell your senators to cosponsor this important bill?