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Consumer News & Alerts

February 26, 2007

THE INDUSTRIALIZATION OF FOOD
Our footloose Tom Glaister, currently writing from India, is the first to admit that one of the drawbacks of being a vagabond writer is the health risk that constant travel entails -- bandits with guns on third world borders, malaria in jungles and the occasional bout of Montezuma's revenge from a steak that hasn't been cooked properly. Food poisoning can hit the traveler anywhere and it pays to be on your guard.

"I was recently hanging out in a country where everyday around 200,000 people get sick from bad food, 900 are hospitalized and 14 die," Glaister writes. "All in all it was quite a scary experience eating out in the U.S.A."

With that, Glaister launches into a bare-knuckle look at what food has become in the Western world -- a branded industrial product stamped out, boxed up and shipped thousands of miles for consumption by consumers who may pore over the "ingredients" label and count the calories and grams of fat without giving a second's thought to where their chosen "product" came from, not to mention how it was produced, handled and transported. Never mind the recent spate of acute poisonings from peanut butter, spinach and other seemingly harmless dishes, Glaister warns the real danger comes from the bizarre diseases we don't even know about ... yet.

Irradiation Debate Flares The latest food-borne pestilences are stirring up the simmering debate over irradiation, a process already widely used around the world to kill harmful pathogens in produce, spices, meat and prepared foods. Unfortunately, the debate is starting to resemble a political campign, with both sides hurling invective, exaggerated rhetoric and personal slights at the other.

A DIRTY BUSINESS
The outbreak of peanut-butter-induced Salmonella poisoning is most likely the result of dirty jars and equipment, inspectors think. However it happened, the Peter Pan/Great Value poisoning has affected many more than the "hundreds" estimated by federal inspectors. As of Saturday, Feb. 24, ConsumerAffairs.com has received 113 complaints from consumers whose experience ranged from mildly inconvenient to deadly. This is ten times more complaints than we've received in any previous food contamination episode.

If you look through the complaints, you may be interested to note that most of the complainants did not seek medical attention, often because they could not afford to miss work or pay for a doctor's visit. They simply toughed it out. This is very dangerous. While healthy adults can usually -- though not always -- fight off Salmonella, children, the elderly, pregnant women and those with chronic conditions may quickly develop life-threatening complications. Unfortunately, most of the few complainants who sought medical attention were simply told to go home and, yes, tough it out.

Curious about Salmonella? We have a rundown of recent outbreaks and some quick facts.

In other food disasters ...

• Oscar Mayer, Louis Rich Chicken Strips Recalled Listeria contamination was found in one package and the company recalled all of the packages from store shelves.

• Rats! New York KFC Store Has A Problem TV crew catches rats scampering around a Greenwich Village KFC store. Yes, we have the footage.

LUNCH BOX FIGHT
The Consumer Product Safety Commission is denying that it missed high lead levels in children's lunch boxes. An Associated Press report suggested that the CPSC may have hidden the true levels of lead found in the lunch boxes, a charge the agency denied. Nevertheless, both New York and Connecticut took action to have the vinyl lunch boxes removed from store shelves.

PAYDAY LENDERS FIGHT BACK
The Pentagon has been up in arms about the payday loan industry shellacking its soldiers but Congress hasn't seen fit to do anything to rein in the usurers, thus consigning the battle to the state legislatures. In Virginia, which is nothing if not friendly to predatory businesses, a small army of lobbyists has plied the state's notably bumptious lawmakers with soporific bilge about what a great public service they render. Why, they coo, without payday lenders, where would our impoverished military families find those convenient 390 percent loans?

A MYSTERY WITHIN A MYSTERY
Crooks broke into the offices of Speedmark, a marketing services firm that employs "mystery shoppers" and made off with computers containing some shoppers' personal data, including name, address and Social Security number. As usual, the company took its time telling anyone about it, using the lame excuse that its contract with the mystery shoppers specified that all notices must be made by mail.

In other privacy and identity theft news ...

They Stopped & Shopped Crooks cleverly tampered with the checkout-lane card readers at Stop & Shop markets in Rhode Island, enabling them to swipe customers' PIN numbers. The company says it has "bolted down" the card readers to prevent future incidents.

TJX Data Breach Even Bigger TJX now says the earliest intrusions into its databases were 10 months earlier than previously reported. Also, TJX confirmed that shoppers in the U.K. and Ireland were affected, in addition to customers of TJX-owned stores such as Marshall's and T.J. Maxx in the U.S., and Winners and Home Sense in Canada.

Hackers Go Phishing with Google Proving that human ingenuity is alive and well, scammers have figured out how to identify their victims' physical location using Google maps. Perhaps they'll soon be able to use satellite imaging to see what's in your trash.

IS THERE A DRUG SAFETY CRISIS?
There certainly seems to be, what with drugs being recalled, pulled off the market and blamed for all kinds of peculiar side effects. But University of Chicago researchers say they find little evidence of any crisis and no scientific evidence to back up sweeping recommendations recently made by the Institute of Medicine (IOM), which called for the FDA to look more carefully at new drugs. Instead, the Chicago scientists say, stronger surveillance of already-approved drugs makes more sense.

More health notes ...

• FDA Wants Stronger Warnings on ADHD Drugs Commonly-prescribed drugs can contribute to heart and psychiatric problems, the agency finds.

• FDA Wants Stronger Warning for Asthma Drug Xolair may cause anaphylaxis hours after injection.

• The Healthy Geezer: "Low Vision" in Seniors Needs Early Treatment "Low vision" isn't the same as being near-sighted. Professional diagnosis and treatment is needed.

• Key to Reducing Cancer Risk Eating a low-fat diet, exercising regularly, avoiding tobacco can cut risk in half.

• Genetic Factors Linked to Nicotine Dependence More research could lead to more effective quit-smoking programs.

A MOUNTAIN OF LUGGAGE
While JetBlue was dodging snowballs, US Airways was wondering what to do about a growing mountain of luggage at its Philadelphia hub. The bags were from planes that were grounded, diverted, delayed, misdirected or just plain stuck after the big East Coast ice storm of a week or so ago. Adding insult to injury, most of those whose bags were lost had to wait in line for hours to file claims with the airline's baggage service department. Sadly, US Airways had just spent $20 million on a new baggage-handling system intended to prevent just such snafus.

JetBlue's Mea Culpa JetBlue did something very unusual after the big storm. It apologized -- publicly and profusely -- for all the flights that were canceled and delayed after the ice storm paralyzed its JFK hub. Most airlines simply ignore passengers' pleas but JetBlue is implementing its own "Passengers Bill of Rights" that includes payments and free flights for similar foul-ups in the future. Crisis managers are giving the spunky carrier an "A" for effort and the airline is hoping passengers will do the same.

Those Darned Kids Yep, delays and lost luggage are bad, but how about those kids? ATA recently ejected (no, not in flight) a family whose wee one was causing consternation. Responding to press reports, more than 14,000 passengers emailed ATA to applaud its action.

TSA Adds Security Checks for Airport Employees In a long-overdue action, the TSA is beginning to conduct random searches of airport employees at Atlanta's Hartsfield International, among others. Don't tell anyone but this has been a gaping hole in the security effort since Day One.

SCAMS & OUTRAGES

• ConsumerInfo.Com Once again, company is accused of deception in marketing "free" credit reports.

• Online Furniture Company collected money, often didn't ship furniture, prosecutor charges.

• "Surplus Goods" Consumers paid up to $8,000 for supposed surplus goods franchise.

• Modeling Most promises are too good to be true.

• Income Tax Scams Inflated telephone excise tax refund claims lead the list this year.

RIGHT TO CRITICIZE
We're constantly hearing from irate businesses who think that no one should be allowed to talk about them. Certain tax-exempt foundations who claim to be press critics aid and abet them in this delusion. Be that as it may, a New York court affirmed last week that the law is clearly and damned near unequivocally on the side of consumers, employees and others who choose to exercise their free speech rights to discuss products, services and working conditions.

We are waiting patiently, by the way, for CNS News to publish the news that the Nemet Auto lawsuit against ConsumerAffairs.com about which it wrote so heatedly in its rather anemic stem-winder was withdrawn by Nemet earlier this month.

THE DAILY BEEF

The most recent complaints of the day ...

• Gardener's Choice Plants often arrive in poor condition, or not at all, we're told.

• National Student Financial Aid Parents pay big bucks for information they could get for free.

• First Premier Bank Card Nice card but the fees eat up the credit line.

• Phony Magazine Subscription Renewals Be sure you're dealing with the magazine, not a third party.

RECALLS

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