One Good Recall Deserves Another: Bagged Lettuce

Earlier this week, Dole Fresh Vegetables announced the recall of its "Dole Hearts Delight"–labeled salad due to E. coli contamination. The recall affects products sold in nine states: Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Tennessee. You can stay safe by avoiding products with use-by dates of September 19 and a production code of "A24924A" or "A24924B" on the package. What is perhaps most disturbing is that just last year Dole was caught up in the massive recall of bagged spinach that sickened 206 people and killed three. For more on that, see our previous coverage here.

Unfortunately, as we've seen with recalls of lead-bearing toys, a lack of regulatory oversight and trained inspectors coupled with an overreliance of voluntary measures has resulted in unsafe products reaching store shelves on a wide scale. Now, even corporations that formerly opposed federal regulations are calling for them to shore up consumer confidence in their products, as noted in recently in The New York Times. In a related editorial, the Times reports that the Bush administration has released a strategic framework to improve the safety of imports by providing for surveillance all along the supply chain. Even if fully funded, however, that won't make food grown in the US any safer. For that, as Food Aid so amply demonstrated, our best bet may well be small farmers.