Finger pointing continues between CFIA and XL Foods
Posted Oct 5, 2012 2:19 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The war of words continues between the company at the heart of the largest meat recall in this country’s history and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.
Friday, the CFIA confirms it has no immediate plans to re-open the XL foods plant in Brooks, which has suspended operations since September 27th.
But what continues to be unclear is why there was a delay in starting a recall, which now includes over 1,800 beef and meat products.
The CFIA says they did not receive the information they formally asked for from XL Foods on September 6th and 7th which led to delays in beginning a recall for another few days.
Dr. Harpreet Kochhar from the CFIA’s western operations says the agency acted as quickly as possible when the information was received on September 10th and 11th.
“When dealing with the Public Health Alerts, the CFIA needs to be sure it has the right products identified and all products identified. This can be a time consuming process.”
CFIA spokesman Tim O’Connor says Bill S-11 when passed, will make this process easier in the future.
“Under the new Safe Food for Canadians Act it gives us stronger powers to not only request that documentation but to request it by a deadline. As well, to request that the method of record keeping needs to be in a manner that is useful to the CFIA,” says O’Connor.
Public health alerts continue to be released, identifying where contaminated products have been distributed across the country.
The agency says investigators are visiting distributors and retailers across the country to ensure consumer safety.
Additional products may be recalled in the coming days, something the CFIA says is common practice as affected products may have been repackaged or processed again at other distributors.
This comes just a day after XL Foods assumed full responsibility for their oversights and shared plans to improve product safety within their plant.
Meanwhile, there’s now one case of E-coli illness in Newfoundland that has been linked to the XL Foods recall.
The Public Health Agency of Canada has confirmed tainted meat is linked to a human illness in the easternmost part of the province.
Health officials in Newfoundland say the victim has since recovered, but they’re still working to confirm the source.
It’s the first case outside Alberta connected to the massive recall.
