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Florida tomato industry in complete collapse In Florida, the No. 1 U.S. tomato producer, $40 million worth of tomatoes will rot unless the U.S. Food and Drug Administration quickly traces the source of the outbreak and clears the state's produce, an industry official said. "We've had to stop packing, stop picking," said Reggie Brown, executive vice president of the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange. "The crop that should have been harvested over the weekend won't survive more than another day or so. The tomatoes we have in storage are getting riper every minute, and at some point it will have to be disposed of," Brown said. The FDA warned U.S. consumers on Saturday that the outbreak was linked to eating certain raw red plum, red Roma, and red round tomatoes, and products containing those tomatoes. Major restaurant and grocery chains stopped selling those varieties, and some stopped selling all raw tomatoes entirely. U.S. growers produced $1.28 billion worth of tomatoes last year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Florida produces an annual crop valued at $500 million to $700 million, and supplies more than 90 percent of the nation's tomatoes this time of year, Brown said. The FDA has said that it is safe to eat cherry tomatoes, grape tomatoes and tomatoes sold with the vine still attached but those account for only a tiny portion of the industry. The FDA has said it does not know where the contaminated tomatoes originated. The infections have struck most often in New Mexico and Texas. The FDA has put California on the list of suppliers not linked to the outbreak. But some supermarkets still rejected tomatoes from that state, which is the No. 2 U.S. producer with $400 million in annual sales. "The reality is that the entire tomato industry is being impacted," said Ed Beckman, president of the California Tomato Farmers. "It wasn't really clear that round and Romas from California are safe to eat. That's part of the problem." The FDA said there had been 167 reported cases as of Tuesday, including at least 23 hospitalizations, related to the outbreak since mid-April. The infections were caused by Salmonella Saintpaul, an uncommon type of the bacteria. Salmonella bacteria are frequently responsible for food-borne illnesses. Symptoms generally appear within 12 to 72 hours after eating infected food and include fever, diarrhea, nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain. With the tainted spinach scare of 2006 still fresh in their minds, buyers and consumers were unwilling to take chances, growers said. Three people died and more than 200 were sickened by eating spinach contaminated with E. coli bacteria. Mexican growers, who produce 84 percent of the tomatoes imported by the United States, were also feeling the pain. "U.S. consumers have started to reject orders that have already been promised or sent and it is causing a lot of damage to producers," said Mario Robles, who directs the investigation arm of the vegetable association in the state of Sinaloa. Mexico sends nearly 700,000 metric tons of tomatoes a year to the United States in a business worth $900 million, according to a Mexican vegetable exporters association. Exports of Mexican agricultural products soared after the United States, Canada and Mexico lifted all tariff barriers under the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement. But the benefits can easily be wiped out by a sanitary scare like the one in 2000, when the FDA identified a strain of salmonella in Mexican melons and banned their import. That cut the $200 million annual export business down to around $3 million, said Robles, and Mexican growers fear the same could happen to tomatoes. Dr. Cinque's comments: We've been through this with melons, lettuce, alfalfa sprouts, spinach, and now tomatoes. What's it going to be next time, cucumbers? They have no evidence that a single tainted tomato even came from Florida, but just as a precaution, they'll go ahead and demolish the entire industry in a state that is already reeling from other woes. Never mind that the actual risk to the average Joe picking up tomatoes at the grocery store is infinitesmal. He faces more risk fighting traffic getting to the supermarket. I'm no expert, but I strongly believe that it is mainly immuno-compromised individuals who are at risk from this kind of exposure. Maybe if doctors didn't prescribe so many acid-blockers, people would have enough stomach acid to ward off stray, errant bacteria that may persist on a tomato or a leaf of lettuce. Remember, one of the purposes of stomach acid is to sterilize your food and water, and anyone who destroys your ability to make stomach acid is no pal. But the fact is that many medical drugs besides acid-blockers weaken your defenses against microbes. Just flip through the Physicians Desk Reference and read the fine print if you don't believe me. The latest news, as I write this on Friday the 13th of June, is that 228 people have been sickened in 23 scattered states. How do they know that all of those individuals were stricken by tomatoes? I presume a person shows up sick, and so they ask what he or she has been eating. "You say you had a hamburger yesterday? Was there a slice of tomato on it? There was? OMG! That had to be it! Quick! Call the CDC!" If that sounds preposterous to you, then somebody please explain to me how the dictocrats know that of 228 stricken people that it was tomatoes that made every single one of them sick. If you tell me that all the victims had eaten tomatoes, I'll point out that just about everybody eats tomatoes. I've been searching online, but I can't find anything about this. I have found references to lab tests confirming a certain kind of Salmonella, but again, how do they know it all came from tomatoes? I guess we're supposed to just take their word for it. But remember that these are the same people who have been telling us for years that 36,000 Americans die each year from the flu- a statistic engineered to sell flu vaccine. The fact is that generating fear is what government does, whether it's fear of Saddam and his nonexistent weapons, fear of Iran, fear of the flu, and now fear of tomatoes. I can assure you that I am buying and eating tomatoes these days just as freely and wantonly as I ever have, and I refuse to waste one iota of my energy giving this crisis a moment's worth of worry. And considering how widespread and geographically diverse the breakout has been, isn't it virtually certain that many more people have been exposed to the tainted tomatoes than reported and without getting the least bit sick? This can't be a case in which a farm worker used the bathroom and failed to wash his hands afterwards and then handled some tomatoes because how many tomatoes could he have handled and how could those tomatoes have wound up all over the country from New York to New Mexico? With nearly half of the 50 states involved, it must have affected tons of tomatoes, and yet only 228 people have gotten sick? That many people get sick from eating bad hotdogs at a Major League baseball game. (Just kidding) But seriously, it's not as though tomatoes are grown or handled differently than other kinds of produce. So, if you're going to react to this scare at all, you'd have to quit eating fresh produce entirely. I think you should simply rinse your produce well and leave it at that. Finally, remember that E. Coli and Salmonella come from animals- from animal waste- and the solution is to stop generating so darn much of it. E-mail to a friend Previous Article |
