Tomatoes and salmonella: avoiding ambiguity

I talked to a distributor of Mexican tomatoes in Nogales today who said they were now selling about 60% of their production from Sonora at depressed prices, leaving 40% behind in Mexico.

No word yet about the FDA investigative team in Mexican, other than the fact they are apparently traveling with their Mexican counterparts and super secretive about where they are going and what they are looking for.

The distributor's biggest concern is that the FDA will come up with an ambiguous result, with no certainty of where the contamination occurred and what caused it. He also chafed at the idea that the FDA's David Acheson is using the occasion to ask for more authority for the agency. "We have all been 100% cooperative."

Meanwhile, the FDA said they may have another conference call this afternoon. A little illumination, gentlemen?

At this point, can we call the FDA's management of the salmonella investigation incompetent, as some have said? Certainly, the FDA's advice to consumers has been confusing. Many loads of good tomatoes have been thrown away. Yet the contention by some critics that the outbreak is over doesn't seem to be supported by facts. The CDC today pushed the number of victims of salmonella saintpaul higher again, to 707.

I think the industry should tread lightly in respect to damning the agency's efforts. I don't think you will hear PMA or United describing the FDA investigation with the term "incompetence."
Frankly, I would be shocked if they ever did. Until I hear United's David Gombas and PMA's Bob Whitaker call the FDA incompetent, I tend to discount any such talk by anyone else.

Don't forget that one of the big hurdles the agency faced in their traceback investigation was the apparent absence of an effective industry traceability/record keeping system for fresh tomatoes.

The most unsatisfying result for the FDA's traceback investigation would be ambiguity. If that is the result of these weeks of travail, perhaps "incompetence" may not be too strong a characterization.