Delauro calls for USDA, FDA to coordinate attack on BSE (June 30, 2005) via Meatingplace.com
Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) has sent letters to the heads of the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration urging them to coordinate their oversight of bovine spongiform encephalopathy to avoid "presenting a dangerous gap in oversight of our food supply." DeLauro told Meatingplace.com that with more members of the House becoming concerned about the conflicting and overlapping roles of the two agencies, hearings may be scheduled.

 

She joined Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) in calling for an accelerated program to develop a comprehensive animal identification and traceback system. "We've been talking about this for years and years," she said. "It's time to do something." Goodlatte, the chairman of the House Agricultural Committee, has said that he is open to a system developed by private industry if it can be enacted quickly, unlike USDA's National Animal Identification System (NAIS), which won't become fully operational until 2009.
In her letters to USDA and FDA, DeLauro demanded that loopholes in the ruminant-to-ruminant feed ban be closed, that USDA develop a credible testing protocol for BSE, and that a national traceback system be established immediately.