News

A One Health issue, Food Safety---   Food Safety in USA: Irradiation of Food, an essential tool neglected for decades…   a disgrace!     http://www.onehealthinitiative.com/publications/FoodSafetyIrraditiontoolOHIwebsitePostingApril30,2014.pdf   “Michael T. Osterholm [PhD, MPH], director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, blames an *“anti-science movement” for the public resistance. He is frustrated with the federal government for endorsing irradiation but then not educating the public as it has with childhood immunizations and water fluoridation. “Not using irradiation is the single greatest public health failure of the last part of the 20th century in America,” said Osterholm, citing CDC estimates that 1 in 6 people will get food poisoning this year and 3,000 will die. “We could have saved so many lives.”  The Washington Post April 28, 2014 http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/efforts-to-zap-bacteria-in-food-are-slow-to-catch-hold/2014/04/27/bf406d3c-cbbe-11e3-95f7-7ecdde72d2ea_story.html [an outstanding journalistic-educational public service presentation]. **Dr. Osterholm, an eminent internationally known public health expert, has voiced a long recognized and tragic “public health malpractice” by those with fiduciary responsibility to protect the U.S. public from foodborne illness and death!  The One Health Initiative Autonomous pro bono team shares his frustration.   Why has this happened?  Because of loud vocal—outspoken—public misinformation, distortions and prejudicial ignorance disgracefully unchallenged efficaciously by federal, state and local governments as well as major news media sources and allegedly responsible consumer activist advocates for decades.  This has left a large segment of the consumer public in the dark and irrationally fearful about the safety of ingesting irradiated food(s)… meanwhile untold numbers of American citizens (men, women and children) have become ill and died unnecessarily over the decades as a result.  During the early history of pasteurization, this same *canard against the process was and is unfortunately again being spewed today.   Please read the scientific truth: U.S. Food and Drug Administration: http://www.fda.gov/Food/ResourcesForYou/Consumers/ucm261680.htm U.S. Department of Agriculture – Food Safety and Inspection Service: http://www.fsis.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsis/topics/food-safety-education/get-answers/food-safety-fact-sheets/production-and-inspection/irradiation-and-food-safety/irradiation-food-safety-faq U.S. Environmental Protection Agency: http://www.epa.gov/radiation/sources/food_history.html U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: http://www.cdc.gov/nczved/divisions/dfbmd/diseases/irradiation_food/ **Dr. Osterholm http://www.cidrap.umn.edu/about-us/cidrap-staff/michael-t-osterholm-phd-mph is also one of the longstanding distinguished participating members of the One Health Initiative team’s Honorary Advisory Board http://www.onehealthinitiative.com/advBoard.php.