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IG: Recall work careless
WASHINGTON (AP)--Because of poor record-keeping and a "careless approach" by Agriculture Department officials, the government can't be sure how much meat is removed from the market in recalls, the agency's top internal watchdog said July 15.
A report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's inspector general's office on a 2002 recall of 27.4 million pounds of sliced deli poultry from a Wampler Foods plant in Franconia, Pa., found discrepancies or missing data in 389 of 582 department records tracking the results.
"We attributed this high error rate to the careless approach compliance officers and supervisory personnel took in overseeing the recall," the report said. "Until it corrects the problems we identified, FSIS's conclusions regarding the effectiveness of food safety recalls may be based on inaccurate and incomplete information."
The department's Food Safety and Inspection Service signed off in July 2003 on terminating the recall after Wampler said it had recovered more than 5.5 million pounds of the product.
Because of the paperwork errors, "FSIS did not have reasonable assurance that potentially adulterated product bearing the USDA seal of inspection had been retrieved," the inspector general's report said.
Department officials said Thursday the agency has learned by the Wampler experience and is implementing changes addressing the auditors' findings.
"FSIS has made substantial changes to its recall process, strengthened verification activities, and established clearer lines of authority," said Dr. Barbara Masters, the agency's acting administrator.
Pilgrim's Pride (PPC), which owns Wampler Foods, ordered the recall in October 2002 after government officials found listeria, which can cause illness and death, in a floor drain. The listeria strain was the same one blamed in an outbreak that killed eight people and sickened 45 others starting in July of that year. A matching strain also was found at another plant, J.L. Foods Co., in Camden, N.J.
Compliance officers often did not match the records of poultry purchased from Wampler with the amounts Wampler said it had shipped to those companies, the inspector general's report said. It also said officials did not always document follow-up visits to check the status of product the companies were holding pending further instructions.
The FSIS said it uses data other than the tracking records--such as epidemiological reports on whether a foodborne illness outbreak had ended--in deciding to end the recall.
However, it was not clear how much weight the agency gave to those epidemiological reports, the inspector general's report said.
Date: 7/20/04
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