5 ms·
So let's see, in the past few years we've had the Boar's head listeria recalls, Taylor farms lettuce contamination, the McDonalds e.coli recalls in 14 states, n
by randycupertino 2mo ago
So let's see, in the past few years we've had the Boar's head listeria recalls, Taylor farms lettuce contamination, the McDonalds e.coli recalls in 14 states, now chicken wings...
Defunding the FDA and forcing out 4500 staff via DOGE cuts caused this. Right now we have 400 safety inspectors covering 36,000 facilities vs the FDA's own estimates they need at least 1,500 inspectors.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/19/health/food-safety-trump-fda-cutbacks-deadly-outbreaks.html https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/19/health/food-safety-trump-...
- xyzelement 2mo agoThe USDA was the one to issue this recall. Inadequate number of inspectors would make recalls go down not up.
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- thenayr 2mo ago[dead]
- makeitdouble 2mo agoThese problems will surface whenever they get big enough, whatever size the agency is. As an extreme, if there was one single guy in charge you'd still get recalls every time a problem reaches national levels, and you could get a lot of them. Increasing inspectors and making the agency do more will help deal with issues before they reach that level (that's also assuming regulations are favorable to their job...), potentially lowering the number of wide range recalls they have to call for.
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- mrguyorama 2mo agoNo this makes no sense. Like, I can see where you were thinking, but it's just wrong with the USDA because of how different problems at different points are handled. When an inspector in a plant notices a problem, like an employee not following hygiene rules, that doesn't trigger a recall, because that's not enough evidence of unsafe product. They usually issue a "Noncompliance Record", which the plant is required to resolve. Inspections aren't usually the trigger for a recall! If an inspection surfaces evidence of an active health hazard, like some biological test comes back with a pathogen, that could trigger a recall. Here, the facility was flagrantly violating the law in it's entirety. Unless they were somehow doing this on accident, they have been operating fraudulently. This recall is because this product was not inspected at all, and so via the precautionary principle, and also as a somewhat punitive action, the product has to be recalled. More frequent inspections could only have caught this earlier. More frequent inspections will cause more problems to be Noncompliance that gets fixed rather than a problem persisting until it makes someone sick and that actually triggers a recall. Inspections prevent recalls. Few inspections allow problems to escalate to recalls.
- Carrok 2mo agoYou don't have to go back years, months will do. There are more than you listed as well, like the raspberries https://www.fda.gov/food/outbreaks-foodborne-illness/outbreak-investigation-e-coli-o145h28-frozen-blueberries-july-2026 https://www.fda.gov/food/outbreaks-foodborne-illness/outbrea...
- tredre3 2mo agoIt sounds bad when you only point out the recent examples, but overall the recalls haven't increased under Trump. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2026/08/28/food-recalls-under-rfk-jr-data/91494801007/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2026/08/28/food-r... One might be tempted to wave the numbers away as "Obviously there are fewer recalls, because they don't do inspections to begin with!" That might be true. It's hard to prove or disprove, though. Perhaps if we look at the statistics on the other end, the actual hospitalizations from tainted food?
- nazgulsenpai 2mo agoReasonable take, source provided, yet downvoted. I have a boatload of issues with Trump admin, but the stats here are hard to dispute. I guess it's just making news more now.
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- bix6 2mo agoNo it’s an asinine take when you stop and think. People were fired, agencies were thrown in disarray, there’s constant reports of them fudging numbers or just straight up not doing the work to collect the actual numbers, and you want to try and pretend this is reasonable?
- nazgulsenpai 2mo agoThis is conjecture. Right now the stats simply don't reflect it. If there's evidence of corner cutting leading to rising reports of recalls or foodborne illness outbreaks, I'll certainly reconsider.
- bix6 2mo agoYou’re right, we should totally give them the benefit of the doubt!! https://www.notus.org/trump-white-house/federal-data-is-disappearing https://www.notus.org/trump-white-house/federal-data-is-disa... > “The status quo was, the federal government is going to collect and disseminate data and statistics,” said John Kubale, a University of Michigan professor who helps direct the world’s largest archive of social science research data, including sensitive U.S. federal government data. “That is no longer a reasonable assumption.”
- mmooss 2mo agoIf that's true, the opposition should make them pay a political price for it. That's how a competitive political system should work. Yet almost always I hear nothing or almost nothing from the Democrats, not about Taylor Farms either. It's been that way for many years; I can't understand it. If someone doesn't pay a political price for bad performance, they will keep doing it.
- CursedSilicon 2mo agoIt's as if the fourth estate is bought and paid for by a side that directly benefits from these kind of money extracting policies
- InsideOutSanta 2mo agoEvery day something happens that would have been on the daily news for weeks under Obama, but nobody cares because it's Trump. Part of it is media bias, where the right doesn't talk about this stuff because it makes them look bad, and the left doesn't talk about it because they are afraid of being called biased, but I also think it's just too damn much. Everything about this administration is so unhinged, from DOGE to Lake Ontario to Iran to Greenland to taxes to shooting people in the streets to literally every god damned thing that we have absolutely no framework for even conceptualizing what the hell is happening. Also, half the country lives in a bubble where Trump is anointed by god and saving the country from trans vegan child rapists.
- mmooss 2mo agoThat's a descriptive approach; I'm talking about why.
- gnuplustoejam 2mo agoSounds to me like the USDA is working as intended: they caught a company doing shady stuff and forced a recall. Are you really trying to spin your own narrative here, using cherry-picked data and your own link as "evidence"? The Boar's Head *and* McDonalds outbreaks were in 2024 under the previous admin, way before DOGE, completely undermining this sneed.
- MyHonestOpinon 2mo agoI don't really know if this is the cause. But the whole DOGE thing sounded highly irresponsible. Did they understand what they were cutting. Furthermore, there may be even worst consequences in the more distant future.
- shepardrtc 2mo ago> Did they understand what they were cutting. No, they were using llm prompts to make decisions.
- soniczentropy 2mo agoThey absolutely understood exactly what they were doing. They're stupid, but they're not STUPID. Don't let them excuse malice by faking incompetence
- porkpieshoe 2mo agoDOGE carefully cut: - NLRB which was investigating employees fired as retaliation for criticizing Musk's actions - OFCCP which was auditing Tesla for workplace discrimination - EEOC which had sued Tesla for racial harassment and discrimination - Five separate Inspectors General who were investigating Musk's companies - NHTSA which has forced Tesla to perform recalls - CFPB which had proposed rules that would cover Musk's planned payment product - USDA (specifically the person investigating Neuralink) - FDA - also the people investigating Neuralink - SEC, FTC, and NOAA - again, those with Musk related business were cut I am not saying that Musk bribed his way into killing nearly all of the regulatory actions he was facing ... but I am not NOT saying that either. It's pretty clear that DOGE had a lot to do with consolidation of power, and very little to do with cost cutting.
- WillPostForFood 2mo agoThe big Boar's Head listeria recalls were in Summer 2024, before Trump was elected, before Doge existed... https://www.cbsnews.com/news/boars-head-listeria-recall-bug-mold-mildew-what-to-know/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/boars-head-listeria-recall-bug-... https://www.fsis.usda.gov/recalls-alerts/boars-head-provisions-co--expands-recall-ready-eat-meat-and-poultry-products-due https://www.fsis.usda.gov/recalls-alerts/boars-head-provisio...
- gnuplustoejam 2mo agoMcDonalds was October 2024 too. Let's not let facts and real data get in the way though. Every post is being massively downvoted.
- Arubis 2mo agoFiring USDA inspectors etc. is definitely directionally stupid. But yeah, this issue is preexisting. A huge portion of USGov’s rules and regulations were written in response to the social push when stuff like The Jungle was hitting the public perception—which is to say, when public health could be meaningfully improved by a simple non-magnified visual inspection of meat destined for sale. And so that’s what we get: a visual inspection of meat destined for sale. Say what you will about the overall regulatory environment of Canada and the EU—you can buy meat there and know that you will not get salmonella, because it’s been tested for salmonella, and it won’t be sold for consumption if that test is positive. Stateside we’re just told: well, cook it properly or it’s on you.
- gnuplustoejam 2mo ago> Canada and the EU—you can buy meat there and know that you will not get salmonella Where can I locate this Salmonella-immune Bizarro Canada and Bizarro EU on a map? https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2026/04/ongoing-salmonella-outbreak-in-canada-has-sickened-almost-200/ https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2026/04/ongoing-salmonella-ou... https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/article/90-confirmed-salmonella-cases-in-outbreak-linked-to-salami-health-agency/ https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/article/90-confirmed-salmonell... https://www.foodpoisoningnews.com/salmonella-outbreak-in-canada-update-84-total-illnesses-9-hospitalizations/ https://www.foodpoisoningnews.com/salmonella-outbreak-in-can... https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2026/08/polish-eggs-linked-to-4-french-salmonella-outbreaks/ https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2026/08/polish-eggs-linked-to... https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2025/10/salmonella-sickens-50-in-italian-region/ https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2025/10/salmonella-sickens-50... https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2026/04/one-dead-in-german-salmonella-outbreak/ https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2026/04/one-dead-in-german-sa...
- bakies 2mo agoI remember this happening similarly during Trump 1.
- deepfriedbits 2mo agoIt's wild how in America at least, the people have to relearn the same lessons every generation or two. It turns out, some regulations are actually beneficial to a society. Maybe don't take a chainsaw to the groups who implement and look after these regulations.
- ramgine 2mo agoAmericans don’t bother to read or learn from history
- deepfriedbits 2mo agoAmericans are not uniquely ignorant. American ignorance is just blasted out to the entire world to see.
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- tremon 2mo agoThat's true. They are uniquely proud of their ignorance though. It is, as they say, the best -- the greatest. No one does it better. I mean, did you know that dumb was spelled with a -b at the end?
- Terr_ 2mo agoI try to walk a tricky path with foreign critics: Yes, your criticism is mostly valid, but please please do not think "it can't happen in my country", because I remember when I thought that too. This infection on the body politic can and has jumped to infect others, and does not require an abnormally weak host to attack, and overconfidence is a kind of weakness.
- throwaway85825 2mo agoWorse is that we ended up with an oligpoly of 3 foreign owned meat packing conglomerates.
- vkou 2mo agoWho owns them matters less than whether they ever get inspected.
- antonymoose 2mo agoIt will take decades to undo the damage - the blame is most certainly diffuse here.
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- throwaway85825 2mo agoThey have permanent on site inspectors, which is a contributing factor to consolidation. Whether the inspection is worth anything is a different matter.
- gnuplustoejam 2mo ago> Defunding the FDA and forcing out 4500 staff via DOGE cuts caused this. This is great news because it means time travel is possible.
- arjie 2mo agoFunny. Two of OP’s events are prior to the DOGE cuts so they could not be causative. But these panics are so amusing. Pete’s breaking the trains. Hegseth (was it him?) is crashing the planes. RFK’s eating the infected meat. The Haitians are eating the cats and dogs. We need a prediction market for the next panic.
- walrus01 2mo agoDon't worry! They're going to relax the rules on small scale meat processing allowing it to occur at facilities that rarely if ever see an inspector, surely this will make everything better. You can be certain the people of America will be healthier than ever after this amazing initiative. https://news.google.com/search?q=usa+meat+processing https://news.google.com/search?q=usa+meat+processing
- dylan604 2mo ago>You can be certain the people of America will be healthier than ever after this amazing initiative. Naturally. Only the strong survive!
- Bluestein 2mo agoHigh-T, low E. coli!
- rjbwork 2mo agoThe guy in charge of all of this has eaten road kill and rotting carcasses and he appears to be completely fine. I'm sure there will not be any issues.
- nielsbot 2mo agoPart of his eugenics-adjacent philosophy: survival of the fittest. Basically the opposite of the mission of the department he leads (public health)
- walrus01 2mo agoGive it another six months and they'll introduce phrenology for the diagnosis of psychological conditions.
- Terr_ 2mo agoThen when he gets sick, it'll either be kept secret or attributed to nefarious agents of Goldstein seeking to undermine Big Brother. I couldn't possibly be the statistical outcome of like chicken with regular bacteria, oh no...
- codegeek 2mo agoI honestly feel that we living in twilight zone in the United States.
- RobRivera 2mo agoAnd industry is wholesale enjoying the gross drop in QA. I feel like at this point lawsuits need to happen to provide an alternative counter to the urge to drop costs in QA. These businesses earnestly do not care until it affects their bottom line
- onlypassingthru 2mo agoIn order to have grounds for those lawsuits you'll need to show damages first, ie people need to die.
- nickff 2mo agoThe FDA has been failing to complete inspections on multiple types of facilities (drug and food) for a long time, since at least 2018, and it seems to have deep issues with its staff, culture, and/or management: https://investigatemidwest.org/2025/01/14/as-foodborne-illnesses-sicken-tens-of-millions-each-year-fda-falls-behind-on-mandated-inspections/ https://investigatemidwest.org/2025/01/14/as-foodborne-illne... https://medshadow.org/investigating-generics/fda-fails-in-lab-inspections-of-thousands-of-drug-manufacturers-3/ https://medshadow.org/investigating-generics/fda-fails-in-la...
- timetravellingd 2mo ago[flagged]
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- cucumber3732842 2mo agoPer TFA less than one truck load of imported chicken is being recalled across 5 states that are small enough one delivery driver probably hits three of them in a single route because the importer got caught falsifying their paperwork. Your comment and all the speculative piling on it spawned look kinda silly in light of this context.
- Telemakhos 2mo agoThe FSIS, a branch of the USDA (not the FDA: for the difference in jurisdiction see https://www.fda.gov/media/172542/download https://www.fda.gov/media/172542/download), found this problem, according to the original article. The food from the Shanghai Ravioli Company had false inspection marks and no country of origin, much like an earlier case of food imported from Canada. > The products apparently have “false marks of inspection” with “EST. 18004.” Nothing in the article suggests that budget cuts had anything to do with this. USDA safety inspectors doing their job found yet another foreign company failing to protect American health. DOGE and the FDA had nothing to do with this story, but the parent poster felt obliged to make political statements without reading the article, which happens frequently here.
- mannanj 2mo agoIs there evidence to suggest that inspections or shortage of them cause this? Why wouldn’t it be instead a need to cut corners and produce food differently, or anything else?
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