The Superbug in Your Supermarket

A potentially deadly new strain of anti-biotic-resistant microbes may be widespread in our food supply.  MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, is a form of staph bacteria that resists antibiotics (including methicillin), making it hard to treat, even lethal. 

Industrial agriculture is now a potent source of these infections.

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Monsanto’s man Taylor returns to FDA in food-czar role

by Tom Philpott         www.Grist.org

In a Tuesday afternoon press release, the FDA announced that Michael Taylor, a former Monsanto executive, had joined the agency as “senior advisor to the commissioner.” If the title is vague, the portfolio (pasted from the press release) is substantial—a kind of food czar of the Food and Drug Administration:

• Assess current food program challenges and opportunities
  • Identify capacity needs and regulatory priorities
  • Develop plans for allocating fiscal year 2010 resources
  • Develop the FDA’s budget request for fiscal year 2011
  • Plan implementation of new food safety legislation

Taylor’s new position isn’t his first in government. He’s a veteran apparatchik who has made an art of the role-swapping dance between the food industry and the agencies that regulate it. (The FDA’s press release highlights his government service while delicately omitting his Monsanto daliances.)

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USDA organic label comes under fire

By Kimberly Kindy and Lyndsey Layton          LA Times  July 3, 2009

Lax agency standards mean that consumers aren't always buying foods without pesticides and other chemicals that were produced in environmentally friendly ways, consumer advocates and lawmakers say.

Three years ago, U.S. Department of Agriculture employees determined that synthetic additives in organic baby formula violated federal standards and should be banned from products carrying the federal organic label. Today those same additives, purported to boost brainpower and vision, can be found in 90% of organic baby formula.