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SOUTHERN FINGER LAKES

COLUMN: The FDA has lost its way

“Become a modern day ‘hunter gatherer” of foods at your local grocers, farms and farmers markets”

An Opinion By Frederick Sinclair

We, as humans, draw life giving and sustaining energy from the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food we eat. The quality of all these sources of sustenance is directly impacts our quality of strength, health and longevity. In early evolutionary times, small groups of hunter-gatherers brought the days foraging back to the communal fire and shelter for sharing. Soon the planting of seeds and animal husbandry supported larger groups, leading to family clans, separate shelters and the loss of primal communal life.  Populations grew and concentrated into clans, then villages, then cities and eventually countries that generate huge demands for food and large scale agriculture.  Governing bodies spawned economies, competition grew exponentially.  Opportunistic doors were flung wide open allowing unbridled greed and exertion of power over natural resources and societal needs. It didn’t take many generations before quantity replaced quality. Mass production and processing, distribution chains and ruthless marketing, overshadowed the age old wisdom of eating naturally grown, raised and prepared, wholesome foods and pride in the production of healthful food.

The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was created to enforce the Pure Food and Drug Act (Act) signed into Law by President Theodore Roosevelt on June 30th 1906.  The initial focus of the Act was to prohibit the interstate commerce in misbranded and adulterated foods, drinks and drugs. There were thousands of questionable remedies, some being harmless and inert but many had narcotic drugs and alcohol indiscriminately being sold without restriction. The goal was to protect the health of the US public and to insure the quality of food, medicine and cosmetics. President Roosevelt’s 1906 Act put forth a mission statement aiming to “prevent the manufacture, sale or transportation of adulterated or misbranded or poisonous or deleterious food, drugs, medications and liquors…” The FDA emerged as a fully functional and funded federal regulatory agency in 1930. A century of rapid population growth, industrialization and public health issues, have continued to increase FDA responsibilities and challenges. The FDA has not been able to uphold the original vision and administer the mission of the Pure Food and Drug Act.  It does remain, however, the law of the land which some elected representatives are actively seeking to revive. The quality of America’s food supply has steadily declined with overwhelming demand and ruthless marketing driving a reappearance of “adulterated, misbranded, poisonous or deleterious food, drugs, medications and liquors.”

Under federal law, the FDA is mandated to insure that all ingredients used in food are safe. However, safety reviews and premarket approval of additives is routinely suspended if are they are declared “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS). Problems arise when the current FDA rules allow companies to make the GRAS determination in house , enabling the skirting of regulatory scrutiny. The Center for Science in the Public Interest has stated “Most consumers would be shocked to know that the FDA has essentially handed the reins over to the food industry.” In 2022 The Environmental Working Group found that 98.7 percent of 766 new food chemicals, added to the food supply since 2000, were not approved by the FDA. When 400 consumers fell ill, after eating the ground beef substitute with wrongfully declared GRAS ingredients in French Leek and Lentil Crumbles – Sold by Daily Harvest, 130 were hospitalized with gut distress, there were liver injuries and 39 had gallbladders removed. It would appear that the FDA has gone the route of several other government agencies and been captured (controlled) by the industries they are intended to regulate. More than 50 % of  the FDA operating budget comes from fees that companies pay them for licensing of products.  Sound familiar?

Here’s what we can do as consumers. Become a modern day ‘hunter gatherer” of foods at your local grocers, farms and farmers markets where you can get to know, question and manage ingredients in your food supply. Check the ingredients on labels at the market before purchasing. Get to know what is good for you to eat and what is not and make the adjustment. Put anything with a long list of ingredients, that you don’t know or can’t pronounce, back on the shelf. Become your own personal and household based Food and Drug Administration and let your elected representatives know you expect them to fix and return the US FDA to accomplishing the legislated mission.