10x13 - Food safety in the United States

[bunniefuu]

Hey there, it's me.
The show hasn't started yet.

It's started a little bit.
I'm already talking to you.

But before the music and the lights
and, theoretically, the laughter,

I wanted to briefly talk to you
about what has been a terrible week.

The immense suffering in Israel
and Gaza has been sickening to watch.

We're not going to be covering it
in the main body of our show tonight,

for a couple of reasons,
first, it's horrific.

I don't really want to tell jokes
about carnage right now,

and I'm pretty sure
that you don't want to hear them.

And second, we're taping this
on Saturday afternoon,

and you'll be watching it
Sunday night,

or Monday morning
through an illegal VPN…

I do know who I am talking to.

But the point is, given how fast things
are moving, a lot could change

between the time I'm saying this,
and the time that you hear it.

But I do have a few broad thoughts
that I think will still apply.

And they have to do with sorrow,
fear, and anger.

Now, sorrow is the first
and most overwhelming feeling.

The images that we've seen this week,
from last Saturday onwards,

have been totally heartbreaking.

Thousands are now dead
in Israel and Gaza.

It has been devastating,
not just to those in the region,

but to diaspora communities
across the world.

Whatever thoughts you have
about the history of this region,

or the current state of affairs,
and I've shared mine on this show,

it should be impossible to see
grieving families and not be moved.

So there's been sorrow this week,
a lot of it, and also fear.

Fear of further att*cks in Israel,
and for those taken hostage,

and fear of what's to come in Gaza,
as Israel's leaders seem intent

on embarking
on a relentless bombing campaign,

mass displacement,
and a potential ground invasion.

I don't know where things stand in Gaza
as you watch this right now,

but all signs seem to be pointing
toward a humanitarian catastrophe.

Israeli officials announced plans to
cut off food, water, fuel, and power.

Hospitals are running on generators.

That has all the appearances
of collective punishment,

which is a w*r crime.

And I think
many Israelis and Palestinians

are feeling justifiable anger,
not just at Hamas,

whose utterly heinous t*rror1st acts
set this week's events in motion,

but also at the zealots and extremists,
across the board,

who've consistently thwarted attempts
at peace over the years.

Israelis and Palestinians

have been let down by their leadership
time and time again,

and I don't have
a great deal of faith

in the leaders currently in charge
to steer us toward peace.

But I do still have some hope.

Because the easiest thing to do
in the world after a week like this

is to engage
in bloodthirsty rhetoric.

And there's certainly been plenty
of that from those in power.

But I will say, I've been struck
by the many ordinary citizens,

both Israeli and Palestinian,

who've called for restraint this week,
and not revenge.

Just listen to how Noy Katsman,

whose brother Hayim
was m*rder*d by Hamas last Saturday,

chose to end this interview.

- I'm so sorry for your loss.
- Can I say one more thing?

Yeah. Thank you so much for…

What I wanted to say is,
the most important for me,

and I think also for my brother,

was that his death won't be used
to k*ll innocent people.

I don't want anything to happen
to people in Gaza

like it happens to my brother.

And I'm sure
he wouldn't have any, either.

So that's my call to my government.
Stop k*lling innocent people.

And that's not the way that brings us
peace and security to people in Israel.

Right. People want
and are entitled to peace.

And I'm not going to tell
either side how to get it,

certainly not in this accent,

which has frankly
done enough damage

in that particular region
to last a f*cking lifetime.

But just know, in the long term,

all the people who want to live in that
region are going to keep living there.

So peace is not optional,
and will require some tough decisions.

And I can't say
where a peace process ends,

but it just has to start

with that kind of ability
to recognize our common humanity.

That's honestly
all I've got for you right now,

but we do still have
our regular comedy show.

And if you're interested,

I'll see you on the other side
of our opening titles,

when there will be lights,
there'll be music,

and, again, purely theoretically,
no pressure on this audience,

at least some sporadic laughter.

And now, this!

Welcome to "Last Week Tonight"!
I'm John Oliver.

Thank you so much for joining us.
It has been a busy week.

RFK Jr. announced he's running
for president as an independent,

Jada Pinkett Smith

revealed that she and Will
have been separated since 2016,

and Senator Bob Menendez

found himself in what's known in
the legal world as "even deeper sh*t".

But we're going to focus on what's
been happening on Capitol Hill.

It's now been a week
and a half since eight representatives

staged a coup
against Kevin McCarthy,

and ever since, the party's been
struggling to pick a new speaker.

Steve Scalise
won a secret ballot on Wednesday

to be put forward
for a vote as speaker,

only to withdraw
the following day,

after it became clear that he wouldn't
be able to win a majority,

and one notable House member

summed up why he personally
could never vote for Scalise.

I've reached out numerous times
to Congressman Scalise,

and me reaching out and asking him
for guidance and his leadership

and him not reaching back out,

that's a dereliction
of his duty as a leader,

so I'm not voting for somebody who
lacks fundamental leadership skills.

- Is he snubbing you?
- I don't know, I don't care, frankly.

Are you sure about that?

'Cause it really seems
like it's because Scalise snubbed you.

Santos saying "I don't care"
in a tone that makes it clear

he absolutely cares

might be the most transparent lie
that he's ever told.

Which is saying something,
because this is a man who said

he was a star volleyball player
at a college he didn't even go to,

and said 9/11 claimed his mother's life
even though records

show she wasn't in New York
and she d*ed in 2016.

For George Santos,
an almost clinically chaotic man,

to decide that you don't have
fundamental leadership skills

is truly damning.

Republicans met behind closed doors
to try and pick a leader.

Although glimpses of chaos
kept leaking into public view,

like when one representative was seen
bringing a lasso into the session.

And you know things are messy
when a U.S. congresswoman

walks down the hallway
with some horse equipment

and all anyone can say is
"That's not important right now!"

Representative Nancy Mace,
one of the eight who ousted McCarthy,

showed up wearing a red A,
and offered an incoherent explanation.

I'm wearing the scarlet letter after
the week that I just had last week,

being a woman up here and being
demonized for my vote and for my voice.

I'm here to let the rest of the world
know, and the country know,

I'm on the side of the people.

I'm not on the side
of the establishment.

I'm gonna to do the right thing every
time, no matter the consequences,

'cause I don't answer
to anybody in D.C.,

I don't answer to anyone in Washington,
I only answer to the people.

Wait!

What do you think "The Scarlet Letter"
is about?

And nobody help her,
let Nancy answer!

I want to hear exactly
what she thinks

the 19th century novel
"The Scarlet Letter" is about.

Do you think Hester Prynne
had to wear a scarlet A

because she girlbossed too hard
for puritanical New England?

I'm just saying,
maybe read a book,

before you try and compare yourself
to its protagonist.

There's a reason that I wouldn't say
I'm like Christian Grey

because I also wear a suit.

That's not what the book is about.
Let's be honest, this suit wears me.

It wasn't just Mace and Santos,

lots of members
were talking sh*t to the press,

with one comparing discussions
to a "marriage counseling session"

and another likening the party's antics
to the TV show "House of Cards".

Which I guess is true, in that
it was kind of fun to watch at first,

but now I'm just exhausted by it.

There's actually another way in which
this drama is like "House of Cards",

and it involves something one
of its key protagonists, Matt Gaetz,

has in common with Kevin Spacey.

Sadly, my lawyers told me
that I can't say what it is.

But I can think it.
And so can all of you.

And to hear some frustrated
House members tell it,

the fundamental problem

is that their party as a whole
is now set up to reward bad behavior.

These guys
want to be in the minority.

I think they would prefer that,

because they can just vote no
and yell and scream all the time.

And, but governing,
you've got to work together.

It's a tough scenario,
but there are people in there

that are honorably
trying to get to the right place,

and then there are people in there,
as you know, that like to go on the TV

and are not necessarily negotiating
for anything other than TV time.

- How does that make you guys look?
- Like a bunch of idiots.

You're right.
You do look like idiots!

And the fact that some of your members
are dressing like they decided

they were going to a Halloween party


But those incentives they mentioned
aren't just at the national level.

As the AP pointed out this week,
"internal conflicts and power struggles

have become hallmarks
of the modern GOP",

right down to the state
and local levels.

In Ohio,
Democrats had to cross party lines

to end a standoff over who would
become speaker of the House.

In Texas, this week,
the Republican attorney general

suggested he'd request criminal charges
against members of his own party,

who incidentally led an impeachment
trial against him last month.

And in Michigan,
back in July,

a state Republican party meeting
devolved into v*olence,

with this county chair getting
into a brawl with a party delegate.

Surveillance video from the hotel
doesn't capture the initial encounter,

but it does show the melee
moving into the hallway

as DeYoung
falls hard on his back.

He told police his dentures
were damaged during the fracas.

I literally opened the door,
and he kicked me in my crotch.

I didn't even have a second.
I didn't have a second.

Yeah, he was kicked in the balls.

I know that's the eye-catching part
of this story,

but don't sleep on "his dentures
were damaged during the fracas".

Which I assume is something
that will be said verbatim

after the fantasy suite episode
of "The Golden Bachelor".

This sort of chaotic
Republican infighting

is now a firmly entrenched pattern.

Back in Washington, Jim Jordan
was nominated to be speaker on Friday,

but most people think he's unlikely
to get the necessary votes, either,

meaning we are left
without a speaker,

a position absolutely vital
to a functioning government.

But I guess this is what happens
when a party, for years,

simply refuses to keep
its extremist factions in check.

The sad fact is, many current
Republicans, at every level,

don't seem to want to serve
in government at all,

they want to dismantle it
and stand atop the rubble for a TV hit.

That is the key reason why,
as of taping, any hopes

of an orderly transition of power
from one House speaker to another

have been, much like this Michigan
GOP county chair's testicles,

humiliatingly crushed.

And now, this!

And Now:

Jim Cramer Is Totally
Untroubled By His Haters.

Getting it right
means making logical decisions,

even when they fly
in the face of your beliefs.

That's tough to do, especially
when you're doing it in public as I do,

and you've got a legion of haters
who frankly wish you'd quit.

I love the haters. I wouldn't be
doing this if it weren't for them.

I would've gone down years ago.

I am a spiteful,
driven guy to the haters,

and everyone in my personal life
knows that.

To all the haters out there,
first of all, hi, haters.

Hi, haters!

The haters
are coming out of the woodwork.

In your face, haters.
Haters gonna hate, right?

Even my haters say I got this right.
Must just crush them.

I ain't got no haters anymore.

I've got people I converted to people
who don't like me as much.

I don't fear the haters. Perhaps,
it should be the other way around.

David, if all I cared about
were people who hated me,

then you know what, I would be
under that table just saying:

"What do you want, David?"
I'd be a lap dog.

- No, that's not gonna happen.
- No. I'm not a lap dog.

- Don't you worry about the haters.
- You'd be feeding me Purina.

- Yeah. I would.
- No. Maybe Kittles.

- You like Kittles?
- I do.

- Maybe Blue Buff from General Mills.
- That's very healthy.

Or Chewy. You could send me…
I'd be an a*t*matic Chewy.

- You could put me right down there.
- Let's get to an Opening Bell.

Moving on.
Our main story tonight concerns food.

Whether you're a vegan, a carnivore,
or somewhere in between,

all of it is either ripped
from its home or dies screaming.

Food is fun!

Specifically, we're going
to talk about food safety.

A vital component of public health,
as demonstrated by this old PSA

about a m*llitary base having to deal
with an outbreak of salmonella.

At midnight, about 40 of us
in the duty section got a light meal.

It was just about this time that things
were beginning to happen.

It began like this.

At first, a few of the men who
weren't in the duty section got sick.

And it got steadily worse.

Vomiting, abdominal pains,
and diarrhea.

It was hard to tell
which caused the most trouble.

Except it isn't, because diarrhea
causes the most trouble.

There is no doubt about that.

If you had to choose
between those three symptoms,

diarrhea is dead last,
every single time.

Abdominal pains, not fun.
But sometimes your tummy hurts.

Vomiting, awful, but at least you can
somewhat control the trajectory.

It is possible
to daintily vomit in public.

But there is absolutely no way
to retain any shred of dignity

once you have shat yourself,
it is game over.

You can't come back from that.

You're basically an animal,
you live at the zoo now.

You've probably experienced
getting sick from food at some point.

It happens a lot.
Every year,

an estimated 46 million Americans
are sickened by foodborne illnesses,

and of them, 128,000 are hospitalized,
and about 3,000 die.

It is in the public interest to try
and prevent any of that from happening,

which is why, so often, you'll turn on
the TV and see stories like these!

Kraft Heinz
has voluntarily recalled


con queso mild cheese dip

out of botulism concerns.

An expanded recall of peaches
linked to a salmonella outbreak.

Several Jif peanut butter products
are being pulled from the shelves.

Stores cannot sell this cereal legally
because of this recall.

If you have the Honey Smacks
in your pantry, please throw it out.

So, couple of things there.
On the first one, honestly,

I'd always assumed
that all Taco Bell jarred products

could give you botulism.

You want the spice, you roll the dice.
Everyone understands that.

And as for
"throw out your Honey Smacks",

that's pretty good advice
even when there's not a recall.

Look at this sh*t! It looks
like maggots glazed with sugar.

And that's without getting
into the mascot. Who is this?

Cereal mascots
are supposed to be charming,

whether they're a cultural stereotype
that this accent doesn't get to enjoy,

or an inappropriately sexy tiger,
but this?

This is nothing.
Why does your shirt say "dig 'em?"

Dig what? The Honey Smacks?
Absolutely not, you amphibian pervert.

When you see stories like those,
you would assume that the government

is constantly on the lookout
for potentially dangerous food.

But it's become increasingly clear
that our food safety system,

in particular,
the Food and Drug Administration,

which oversees most of it,
has some serious shortcomings.

In 2016, an audit
done by the agency itself

found unacceptable delays in getting
dangerous food off the shelves,

finding that in 30 recalls,

it took an average of 57 days
from when the FDA was notified.

And the author of that report
acknowledged that was a big problem.

Unless you get all the product
off the shelf, people still are at risk.

If you are playing Russian roulette,
you took all the b*ll*ts out of the g*n

and you put it to your head,
there's no risk.

But if there's still
a couple of b*ll*ts left in there,

you're still playing Russian roulette,
aren't you?

That is an alarmingly apt metaphor for
the current safety of our food supply.

Although, real quick,
if you are playing Russian roulette

and you take all the b*ll*ts
out of the g*n,

for what it's worth, you are no longer
playing Russian roulette.

You're in a community
theater production of "The Seagull".

I had to leave at intermission,
but you were so good!

The FDA's shortcomings
were badly exposed last year,

when Abbott, a company that makes


shut down its factory
over serious safety violations,

violations that the FDA clearly
should've acted on much sooner.

A sign of trouble came last September
in a report to the FDA.

An infant who became ill
with a rare bacterial infection

had consumed formula
made at the Abbott plant.

In October,
an Abbott whistleblower

sent FDA officials
this 34-page document

alleging that "lax practices,
including regulatory violations,

were consistently overlooked".

It wasn't until January 31st
that the FDA

sent a team to the Abbott facility
to investigate.

There, they found evidence
of bacteria

in a powdered
infant formula environment

that can be deadly to infants.

It's true,
the FDA took four months

from their first sign something
was wrong to do a follow-up inspection.

And at that point, at least four babies
had been hospitalized, and two d*ed.

Even an internal FDA report
afterwards concluded the agency

had "systemic vulnerabilities",

and a much more scathing
outside audit faulted them

for "lack of communication
and engagement across the agency".

But the truth is, "Scathing Report
Finds Fault with the FDA"

is just not a new story.

It has happened again and again,

you can find similar reports
in 2010, 1991,

and even this one,
from back in 1969.

The American consumer

is surrounded by an arsenal of products
which can k*ll or maim him.

The Food and Drug Administration

has neither the money
nor the authority to do much about it.

That's the gist
of a confidential report

prepared by seven senior members
of the FDA.

That is Walter Cronkite
flagging the state of the FDA

as a serious problem
half a century ago.

And if something
that he reported on is still an issue,

you know you've got a problem.

I'm just saying, if JFK was still
regularly getting sh*t in Dallas,

you'd really hope somebody would've
done something about it by now.

But given that we've known
the way the FDA regulates food

is some version of f*cked
for decades,

tonight, let's talk about why that is,
and why it's been so hard to fix.

Despite the FDA standing
for Food and Drug Administration,

the two parts of that are not given
remotely equal weight.

dr*gs are prioritized heavily.

"FDA commissioners almost always
come from the medical side,

and have almost no experience
with food issues."

Apparently, it's a "long-running joke
among FDA officials

that the F in FDA is silent",

Its own staff,
including some FDA commissioners,

have been known to slip up and call it
the "Federal Drug Administration".

There's only two things to remember
in the name: food and dr*gs.

If you need a helpful mnemonic for it,
remember this simple phrase:

"food and dr*gs",
it's two f*cking words.

Also, the FDA doesn't actually oversee
the safety of all food in the U.S.

It oversees around 80% of it,
but the remaining 20%

largely falls under the USDA's
Food Safety and Inspection Service.

And the division of responsibilities
can get maddeningly complicated.

While the USDA oversees beef,
poultry, and some egg products,

and the FDA oversees the rest,

in practice, where the exact lines
get drawn can get ridiculous.

Take a look at this. Beef broth, made
in a plant regulated by the USDA,

which inspects every day.

But chicken broth,
made in a plant regulated by the FDA,

which is inspected
once every five years.

In the frozen food aisle,
cheese pizza is regulated by the FDA.

Pepperoni pizza?
That's the USDA.

The fish? That's FDA,
except one, catfish, that's USDA.

Yeah, it's pretty confusing.

It can be very difficult to guess which
agency oversees which kinds of food.

For example: eggs in their shells?
FDA.

Eggs processed into egg products?
USDA.

The feed that egg-laying hens eat?
FDA again.

Open-faced meat sandwich?
USDA.

But closed-faced meat sandwich?
That's FDA.

And if you make a half-cheese,
half-pepperoni pizza

and then put an egg on top,
the whole government explodes.

That fractured structure

can create a lot of cracks
for problems to fall into.

Then, there are the funding issues.

Because despite the fact the FDA
oversees, remember, 80% of food,

they and the USDA

"receive close to the same amount
of funding for food safety oversight",

Meaning that the FDA has to make
the same budget go four times as far.

On top of that, the FDA's job
is actually much more complex.

While the USDA's work is concentrated
in large meat-processing plants,

of which we have relatively few,
around 800,

the FDA's purview includes
about 35.000 produce farms,


establishments,



and roughly 275.000
food processing facilities,

more than half of which
are overseas.

The FDA is spread extremely thin,
and the USDA isn't.

And this discrepancy
helps explain a shocking fact

that came to light after that
baby formula incident last year,

regarding the size of the FDA team

that is tasked with overseeing
those particular factories.

It's a total of nine people

who are focused on infant formula
at the FDA in the budget.

We got an additional four people
allocated last year.

But we're going to need
more than that.

The entire department overseeing
infant formula was just nine people.

That is just not enough!

This show has four interns,
and we need all of them!

But the stakes of their jobs
are just not nearly as high.

Their only life-or-death duty

is making sure that Mr. Nutterbutter
never gets out of his cage.

sh*t! Everybody stay
incredibly still.

So, clearly, some of the FDA's
issues come from without,

in how it's structured
and funded.

But some of its problems
come from within,

like the fact that even
by government standards,

it has an infamously slow
bureaucracy.

Take this very specific announcement
that they made at the end of 2020.

A shakeup for French dressing fans.
The Food and Drug Administration

is proposing removing ingredient
requirements for the salad dressing

at the request of the
Association for Dressings and Sauces.

Dressing must include vinegar, oil,
and lemon or lime

in order to be called "French".

I know that was
about an FDA ruling.

But the only thing that I'm thinking
about after watching that clip

is the Association
for Dressings and Sauces.

I now want to know
everything about them.

I'm guessing ranch and barbecue sauce
are the heavyweights there.

Mayo too, obviously.

And then there's probably turmoil
over the hot young newcomers:

truffle ketchup, green goddess
dressing, all the flashy stuff.

But who do you think the black
sheep of the organization are?

Worcestershire? Maybe some
of the more f*cked up mustards?

This is the only thing
I'm interested in talking about now.

Any time I'm talking about something
else, 90% of my brain is still focused

on the Association
for Dressings and Sauces.

But the point of showing you
that clip is that the FDA

made that announcement
at the end of 2020,

after my new favorite trade group
asked them to do something

about the definition
of French dressing, back in 1998.

And when they announced
the decision,

they didn't even explain why
it took them more than two decades,

spanning one 9/11,
and the dissolution of the Spice Girls,

to arrive at that decision.

But all of this dysfunction
has real consequences.

Because it's not just baby formula
or Honey Smacks that can cause illness.

One of the biggest vulnerabilities
has to do with leafy greens.

They are overseen by the FDA, and are
a major source of food contamination.

And one of the key reasons for that

is that large industrial farms
have become more common,

with livestock raised extremely
close to where crops are being grown,

and sometimes even
sharing a water source.

And that, as this expert explains,
can be a real issue.

How we raise animals can fuel
the growth of these bugs.

If we crowd the animals together

and you have one that's carrying
a bad pathogen like E. coli O157,

then they can poop those bacteria out,
and then the sh*t from the cattle

washes off into the streams
or into canals, irrigation canals.

And then those can be used
to water these plants.

We have this distribution system
for these pathogens

from animals to produce.

There are a lot of excellent production
choices in that documentary,

including deciding to both
cinematically sh**t a cow sh1tting,

and allow someone
to say the word "sh*t".

I support that choice.

You can keep your little pleasantries
like "feces" and "manure",

but it's cow sh*t!

Call it what it is. We know it when we
see it, if not always when we eat it.

But the point is, that sh*t
can go from the animals, into water,

which is then sprayed
directly onto the lettuce.

And given the growth
in boxed and bagged salads,

one head of contaminated lettuce can
get spread out across a lot of people.

And while, with meat,

you can k*ll off a lot of the pathogens
simply through the act of cooking it,

with produce like leafy greens,
your options are more limited.

Rinsing fruits and vegetables
is always a good idea,

but health experts say
E. coli isn't easily washed away.

A professor who used to say "You can't
sterilize lettuce with a blowtorch".

That is a striking thing
for your professor to have said to you.

Although, to be fair,
it's technically not true,

because you obviously can sterilize
lettuce with a blowtorch.

And the reason I know that is,
just watch me!

I'm not saying this is a good idea,
or that it tastes good afterwards,

I'm saying you clearly can sterilize
lettuce with a blowtorch.

Facts matter.

And all of this
would make you hope

that our produce is as thoroughly
inspected as our beef,

but the opposite is the case.

While there are over 7,000 workers
overseeing beef for the USDA,

there are 614 FDA field investigators
responsible for leafy greens.

And I would say that this is
a disaster waiting to happen,

except it already has happened,
and repeatedly.

In 2018, an E. coli outbreak
in leafy greens

sickened 240 people and k*lled five
across 36 states.

Later that same fall,
a different E. coli outbreak hit,

again in leafy greens,

but the FDA was so tied up
dealing with the first one

that an FDA executive
wrote to his colleagues

"I have no resources to deploy".

It's a little disconcerting

that messages from a modern
public health department

sound a lot like missives
from the Civil w*r.

And as this
food safety expert explains,

all of that leads
to a truly striking truth.

When you eat a hamburger,

the most dangerous part
of that is not the burger.

It's going to be the onion,
lettuce, and the tomatoes.

That's not great to hear, is it?

I don't want to live in a world

where lettuce, onion, and tomatoes
are dangerous,

and I don't want to live in a world
where going to Panera is edgy.

Panera is, and should always be,
a milquetoast suburban destination

where women in their 50s gossip,
girls in their teens gossip,

and one very old man eats a bagel
over the course of three hours.

Panera should not be edgy,

but as the FDA seems to have turned
a Greek salad into a loaded g*n,

I guess it f*cking is now.

So, it should be clear a massive
overhaul is needed here.

And you should know,
overhauls in food safety can happen!

It happened
to the USDA 30 years ago,

after undercooked hamburgers
at Jack in the Box restaurants

led to "one of the worst
E. coli outbreaks in U.S. history".

Four children d*ed during that,
something that, just as a side note,

Jack in the Box executives at the time
could've handled with more tact.

The company's president
says Jack in the Box

will pay all medical expenses
for those who got sick,

and he urged customers to come back
to avert another blow to the company.

And that second tragedy
would be loss of jobs.

That is a shitty response.
How is it the customer's responsibility

to keep your employees
from losing their jobs?

If we accidentally k*lled four people
during one of our stupid explosions,

I wouldn't be begging you
to keep watching our show.

I'd be getting sent to prison.

Except I'm kidding, rich white
celebrities don't go to prison.

Felicity Huffman took one for
the whole team, so now we're square.

The point is, after Jack in the Box,
there was a public outcry,

prompting a major overhaul
to the USDA.

The FDA almost had a similar
moment back in the late aughts.

There were a series
of horrific outbreaks

in peanut butter,
spinach, and other foods.

And in response, Congress passed
the Food Safety Modernization Act,

which gave the FDA sweeping
new powers to regulate food.

And at the time, everyone thought
this was a pretty big deal.

Today, President Obama signs
a bill for the first major overhaul

of the U.S. food safety system
in almost a century.

It will give
the Food and Drug Administration

new powers
to force mandatory recalls

when food borne illness
or other hazards

are found
in the U.S. food supply.

If this law is a huge success, a lot of
that success is going to be invisible.

You are not going to be seeing
as many people sick.

Yeah! It sounded great!

Except if all of that had happened,
I wouldn't be doing this story now.

We'd be back to our regularly scheduled
programming of hamster loneliness

or f*ckin' trout gout.

Spoiler alert: it's more common than
you think, and Congress refuses to act.

There were two small problems, though,
with the Food Safety Modernization Act.

We didn't fund the FDA to do all the
new things that we'd asked it to do.

And the agency was still hamstrung
by its glacial bureaucracy.

For instance, the law mandated
that the FDA come up

with a standard for water
being used in agriculture,

a way to keep your salad

from getting lightly misted
with microscopic cow sh*t.

It's 12 years later, and it still
hasn't produced a final rule.

They did, in December 2021,
unveil a proposed rule,

but it had some problems, including
that it didn't mandate any testing.

Onstead, it asked producer growers

to identify and address
their own potential hazards.

Which is less of a water standard
and more of a self-graded water quiz.

While it would be great

if businesses could be trusted
to keep themselves in check,

but that's not generally
how things go.

For a good example of this,
look at literally any business!

Some people might argue that the FDA
simply needs to be funded better,

and that its lines of authority
need to be clearer.

And to be fair, there has been
some recent progress there.

Just last month, they established
a new role at the agency,

so one person could be in charge of
the FDA's entire food safety program.

It's a bit incredible that that role
didn't exist until just now,

but still, I will take it!

The problem is, history strongly
suggests that it won't be enough.

A much bolder plan would be
to break the FDA up completely,

and in doing so, create a new agency
solely devoted to food.

That's a big move, and one
likely to face significant resistance,

and it would need to be done
very carefully.

But I would argue
it might be worth it.

So many experts
we talked to for this story

said that if we were to build
a food safety system from scratch,

it'd look nothing like the fractured
system that we have today.

And the fact is,
under the system we have right now,

future outbreaks aren't just possible,
they're absolutely inevitable.

And I, for one,
do not want to live in a world

where the only 100% safe way
to prepare a very, very basic salad…

is this.

And now, this!

And Now:
Check Out the Sexual Tension

Between Fox Business's Liz Claman
and Charlie Gasparino.

My DNA came back
from 23andMe.

Do you have some of us in you?

- I am part of the tribe.
- Impossible.

- 60% Southern Italian.
- Okay.

- 30% Eastern European Jew.
- Now I know why I like you.

I went to a conference once
and I had Chick-fil-A. Delicious.

- That's very alluring.
- What's the other one?

The other one I went
to that was excellent, Cinnabon.

We can start our own exchange.
Redhead exchange.

- That's right. Testerosa.
- You're called Big Red.

Your show is amazing. Why shouldn't
they give you a good review?

Thank you. Good to see you.

Chris Hemsworth
and Scarlett Johansson…

Stop!

- I'm sorry.
- … cheating on me!

You're not here in studio.
Are you scared?

- I'll be back tomorrow.
- I will scratch you.

I might get up at nine o'clock
and do this.

Baby. You scared?

Get back in the studio tomorrow.
My goodness!

I'm just thinking about how good
it is to have you back.

Thank you.
How do you like my tan?

I'm sorry,
did I talk past my time again?

No, you did perfectly.

I figured you were the one person
around here that would know that.

- You fingered or you figured?
- I figured.

- Thanks, Charlie. Great to see you.
- You want me to leave?

Thanks so much for watching.
We'll see you next week!