Same old same old:
My experience, after 30 years of my mom being in food safety for the USDA and 25 years with the EPA, is that a lot of outfits that violate the rules and end up ‘pizening’ the public one way or another don’t suddenly do so overnight or by oversight. They do it because they’re cheap and they don’t give a damn about the long view on things if they can make a quick buck. They do it again and again, because it’s a part of their sloppiness about any standards. They do it because they can get away with it and nobody’s stopped them yet.
The plant in Georgia that produced peanut butter tainted by salmonella has a history of sanitation lapses and was cited repeatedly in 2006 and 2007 for having dirty surfaces and grease residue and dirt buildup throughout the plant, according to health inspection reports. Inspection reports from 2008 found the plant repeatedly in violation of cleanliness standards.
Inspections of the plant in Blakely, Ga., by the State Agriculture Department found areas of rust that could flake into food, gaps in warehouse doors large enough for rodents to get through, unmarked spray bottles and containers and numerous violations of other practices designed to prevent food contamination. The plant, owned by the Peanut Corporation of America of Lynchburg, Va., has been shut down.
A typical entry from an inspection report, dated Aug. 23, 2007, said: “The food-contact surfaces of re-work kettle in the butter room department were not properly cleaned and sanitized.” Additional entries noted: “The food-contact surfaces of the bulk oil roast transfer belt” in a particular room “were not properly cleaned and sanitized. The food-contact surfaces of pan without wheels in the blanching department were not properly cleaned and sanitized.”
Trust me. I’ve seen rusty vats that food for sale in supermarkets were cooked in. I’ve seen serious filth in food plants, and my mom going after them, usually with a will. She retired as a over-inspector of a quarter of the state of Ohio for the USDA because the meat and poultry standards had been bent to the point of ‘don’t bother those hard-working people in the industry’, and she didn’t want to be a part of all of that.