Radiation Symbol on Irradiated Food????

["Goff, Tom" <tom.goff@rfets.gov>]

Has everyone seen this??????  I think putting the standard radiation symbol
on irradiated food is  wrong!!!!!  Does anyone know why this is happening?
Does anyone know who we should address comments to??  Does the Health
Physics Society know about this??

Tom Goff


Thursday February 25, 12:56 am Eastern Time

Irradiated meat must be prominently labeled - USDA

WASHINGTON, Feb 24 (Reuters) - U.S. meat companies can use 
irradiation to kill deadly bacteria but only if they prominently label 
packages to inform consumers, the U.S. Agriculture Department 
said Wednesday.  

USDA issued the proposed rules at a time when an outbreak of 
listeria in hot dogs and lunch meat produced by a Michigan plant 
has killed 16 and sickened many others.  

Irradiation has been embraced by some experts as an efficient way 
to kill potentially dangerous bacteria in ground beef and other cuts 
of meat. Consumer groups are less certain benefits outweigh the 
risk to worker safety, and meat companies are concerned about 
the cost of installing the equipment.  

Irradiation exposes food to small amounts of radiation from X-ray 
machines or electron accelerators that penetrate and kill bacteria 
without raising the temperature.  

Companies would not be required to use irradiation.

The most controversy over the USDA regulations is likely to center 
on the department's proposed labeling rules.

The USDA wants to require that package labels contain the 
international symbol for radiation and a statement telling 
consumers the product was treated with irradiation. The symbol 
must be ``prominently'' placed on the package and the statement 
printed on the front of the label, the USDA said.  

But regulators said they might also allow companies to adopt a 
more consumer-friendly label that states a product is free of E. coli 
or other pathogens because of irradiation.  

More than 25 percent of Americans are expected to purchase 
irradiated ground beef products, the USDA said.

The cost of treating beef would include between two and six cents 
a pound for the equipment and labeling, amounting to between $35 
and $105 million for irradiating 1.7 billion pounds of ground beef, the 
USDA said.  

Those expenses would be more than offset by fewer food poisoning 
cases, which mean reduced costs for doctor bills and lost work.  

Tom Billy, administrator of the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection 
Service, said the rules must give companies ``significant flexibility'' 
in using irradiation.  

``The Food Safety and Inspection Service has endeavored to 
propose regulations for the irradiation of meat food products that 
set forth performance objectives, rather than prescribe specific 
processing methods,'' the USDA said.  

That means setting a cap on the maximum dose of irradiation for 
beef, and allowing plants to develop their own procedures for use.  

The new rules will also cover poultry. The USDA approved 
irradiation for poultry several years ago, but few companies have 
used it because of the expense.  

Consumer and industry groups have until April 26 to offer their 
views on the proposed regulations. The USDA will then spend 
several more weeks developing a final set of rules.  

An estimated 9,000 Americans die from food poisoning annually, 
according to government figures. The exact number of illnesses is 
difficult to track because many consumers mistake  
food poisoning for other ailments.


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