Opinions

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Oct 4, 2012

''New Food Safety Rules Need to Be Implemented''

Debbie Frederick remembers her father, who passed away from a foodborne illness, as well as millions of Americans who suffer from preventable foodborne illnesses and the thousands who will die each year. She asks that proper protections be put in place to ensure the food on their dinner tables is safe to eat.

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Food Safety
Aug 31, 2012

''President Fumbles on Food-Safety Law''

"Twenty months after President Obama signed the Food Safety Modernization Act, the landmark legislation appears to have suffered the same fate as another important measure: the Physician Payment Sunshine Act. Both historic laws have yet to become a reality because the Obama administration hasn't completed the work of turning the laws' language into practical regulations, then issuing that guidance to the public."

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Food Safety
Aug 30, 2012

''Deadly Wait for Food Safeguards''

Almost two years after President Barack Obama signed the first major changes to food-safety laws since the 1930s, they're still sitting on the back burner. The Office of Management and Budget hasn't signed off on the changes, further delaying reforms that have been debated for years.

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Food Safety
Aug 13, 2012

''Food Safety Delay Puts Lives at Risk''

"It's been a year since a tragic listeria outbreak in cantaloupes began on a Colorado farm, claiming at least 30 lives and infecting nearly 150 people in the largest outbreak of foodborne illness in almost 90 years. Yet, even as we've entered another summer outbreak season, important provisions of a landmark food safety law are still not implemented."

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Food Safety
Aug 13, 2012

''Rules Delayed, Governing Denied''

"It has been 19 months since President Obama signed into law the Food Safety Modernization Act, the first overhaul of the Food and Drug Administration’s food safety laws since the 1930s. But if you think the food supply has become markedly safer since then, think again."

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Food Safety
Jul 26, 2012

''Washington's election-year paralysis hurts the nation''

"A federal food safety law shifting the government's focus from responding to dangerous contamination to preventing it has been heralded as the most sweeping food security reform in decades. But 18 months after the law was enacted, the rules needed to put it into effect are nowhere to be seen. That inaction is just one example of a disheartening election-year paralysis in Washington."

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Food Safety
Jun 6, 2012

''Ignoring salmonella inexcusable''

"Just when you think the Jack DeCoster egg empire couldn't look more rotten ... well, this just in: Court records managers at one of DeCoster's Iowa egg farms knew its hens were "almost certainly" laying contaminated eggs months before one of the nation's largest outbreaks of food-borne illness."

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Food Safety
Nov 23, 2011

''Learning from listeria outbreak''

"Prosecutors may not end up filing criminal charges against operators of a Colorado farm whose tainted cantaloupes are suspected of killing 29 people."

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Food Safety
Nov 11, 2011

''Listeria outbreak cries for changes, not hysteria''

"The cantaloupe-caused outbreak of listeria created a tragedy for those infected by the bacteria and for their families. As of the end of last month, the death toll had risen to 28, the number of reported illnesses had climbed to 133, and one infected woman miscarried."

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Food Safety
Oct 27, 2011

''Tainted fruit''

"The deadly Listeriosis outbreak tied to Colorado cantaloupe is unusual Never before in the U.S. has this disease been known to spread via whole fruit, federal officials say."

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Food Safety
Oct 18, 2011

''Fully fund food safety''

"Among the hazards that face Americans each day, eating cantaloupe is low on the list for anyone who isn't allergic to it. Yet 23 people across the country died recently, and hundreds of others were sickened from eating cantaloupes contaminated by listeria."

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Food Safety
Jun 11, 2011

''When Food Kills''

"The deaths of 31 people in Europe from a little known strain of E. coli have raised alarms worldwide, but we shouldn't be surprised. Our food often betrays us."

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Food Safety
Oct 11, 2010

''The benefit of working together for next farm bill''

"Produce industry leaders call for unity in promoting critical programs for the 2011 farm bill."

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Food Safety
Oct 7, 2010

''Egg Inspections: The View From the F.D.A.''

"Contrary to your article, Food and Drug Administration inspections of the egg industry are on track."

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Food Safety
Sep 26, 2010

''It's enough to make you sick''

"Once again, federal lawmakers failed to take action on much-needed food safety legislation."

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Food Safety
May 15, 2010

''Working to Save Lives With Safe Food''

"At age 2, Kyle Allgood of Chubbuck, Idaho, became sickened by a deadly strain of E. coli O157:H7, from contaminated spinach. When Kyle's abdominal pains would not subside, he was flown to a Salt Lake City hospital, where his downward spiral ended in kidney failure, a heart attack and, ultimately, death.

The tragedy the Allgood family endured is far from rare. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that each year, food-borne illness strikes tens of millions of Americans, hospitalizes hundreds of thousands and kills several thousand—mostly young children like Kyle, the elderly or others who are especially vulnerable."

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Food Safety
Mar 30, 2010

''The price of eggs''

"Last week, fire ravaged a warehouse at a Marseilles, Ohio, egg farm. Power was cut off to two of the farms’ 16 chicken barns, and 250,000 chickens either died or had to be euthanized because of the loss of environmental control."

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Food Safety
Nov 5, 2011

''N.Y. has to really study gas drilling impact''

"When Gov. Andrew Cuomo said he would let science and health concerns drive his decision about issuing permits for hydraulic fracturing natural gas wells, we were encouraged. When we read the draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement prepared by the state Department of Environmental Conservation, however, that encouragement evaporated."

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Health Impact Assessment
Oct 19, 2011

''Thinking outside the doctor’s office to build a strong, healthy nation''

"The most urgent health problems facing our nation — such as obesity, asthma, diabetes, heart disease and injuries — are shaped more by where we live and work than by what happens in the doctor’s office or hospital."

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Health Impact Assessment
May 1, 2011

''Health Impact Assessments Are Needed In Decision Making About Environmental And Land-Use Policy''

"The importance to public health of environmental decisions—including those about land use, transportation, power generation, agriculture, and environmental regulation—is increasingly well documented. Yet many decision makers in fields not traditionally focused on health continue to pay little if any attention to the important health effects of their work."

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Health Impact Assessment
Jan 5, 2011

''Health Impact Assessment: A Tool That Can Build A Healthier America''

"In December, the Department of Health and Human Services released “Healthy People 2020” — a 10-year blueprint aimed at improving the health of the nation. The plan comes amidst rising rates of many diseases – such as asthma and diabetes — and skyrocketing health care costs."

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Health Impact Assessment
Aug 10, 2008

''A Second Chance for Children''

Children can spend months or years in foster care waiting for a permanent home, particularly those who are older or have special needs. The federal Adoption Incentive Program helps by giving states money to promote adoptions of children in foster care. But the program will expire next month unless Congress acts.

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Health Topics
May 13, 2008

''Foster Care Should Respect Heritage''

"According to a report by the National Indian Child Welfare Association and Kids Are Waiting, Washington has one of the nation's highest rates of American Indian foster children. While they make up only 2 percent of Washington's child population, American Indians represent 8.4 percent of children in foster care."

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Health Topics
Dec 17, 2007

''When a Child Can't Be Home for Christmas''

"For youth from foster care, the holidays are often a stark reminder of what it means not to have a family. We miss the comfort of knowing we have a place where we are always welcome, year after year. We don't know the family traditions of mom's best tablecloth and china, dad's carving the turkey, grandma's famous stuffing recipe, football in the den with the cousins, or even the inevitable family dramas."

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Health Topics
Sep 7, 2006

''For Children Raised by Grandparents, Every Day is Grandparents' Day''

"'I raised my grandchildren. I had to because I had no alternative but to raise them,' Dorothy, age 79, says of her grandchildren. "I had to take my little Social Security and my retirement benefits and take care of these kids. I don't know how I did it."Dorothy is remarkable, but not unusual. Rather than let he

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Health Topics