Senate right to table red meat labeling

As part of a massive, $373 billion spending bill approved in the U.S. Senate yesterday,… As part of a massive, $373 billion spending bill approved in the U.S. Senate yesterday, Congress decided to table an issue near to the hearts – and stomachs – of American consumers.

The Senate decided to delay a law requiring country-of-origin labels on red meats, according to a Reuters report, for two years. But that is not enough – the issue should be tabled indefinitely.

Two recent food crises have drawn attention to the way food is treated and handled: a Holstein cow that tested positive for mad cow disease, and a Beaver County hepatitis A outbreak linked to tainted green onions. The Holstein was from Canada, the onions from Mexico.

Yet labeling red meats with their nation of origin will only superficially inform people – these labels won’t specify what the country’s standards are, though all beef should, presumably, be U.S. Department of Agriculture approved. Nor will they do anything but create more food paranoia, which might sour the public to perfectly safe food from other countries.

With all the information, and misinformation, that people are being bombarded with, the last thing we need is food xenophobia. The fact is that mad cow disease – bovine spongiform encephalopathy – is far more of a danger to cattle than to humans. Fewer than 100 cases of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, which is human BSE, have been reported worldwide; none of those occurred in the United States. Labeling red meat as to which country it comes from will do nothing to prevent vCJ infections, which occur because of BSE. And as the meat industry recently realized, disease does not respect national borders.

Moreover, given the public’s persistent fickleness, are we ready to hinge some small nation’s economy on what the American people think is the danger of the day?

Many small meat manufacturers backed this bill, saying that it would boost their sales, while the larger corporations cite the labels as being too costly. Both sides have a point, and one that can be satisfied easily.

If the small manufacturers want meat to be labeled with country-of-origin labels, then they should do so voluntarily. If large companies don’t want to, then they shouldn’t have to. Both of these could occur without unnecessary lobbying and legislation.

Rather than feeding paranoia, the government is already doing its job by providing real, substantive information – the kind available at www.hhs.gov/news/facts. The public will make better decisions with the whole story available, not just a simple, slapped-on label.