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Fresh Spinach Declared Safe to Eat
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"One of the things to determine is whether those guidelines are where they should be. . . . At some point, do there need to be regulations invoked?" he said.
FDA's announcement yesterday cleared the way for spinach from Salinas Valley to return to supermarket shelves.
"There will be product ready. We'll just have to see what consumer demand is," said Bob Perkins, executive director of the Monterey County Farm Bureau.
Some supermarkets have already begun selling spinach. Earlier this week, Giant Food resumed offering bagged savoy spinach, a variety grown in the central and eastern United States. It has no plans to start selling bagged spinach from California, said spokesman Jamie Miller.
Food Lion plans to begin restocking spinach this weekend or early next week, said spokesman Jeff Lowrance.
Safeway plans to start selling bagged spinach again Tuesday or Wednesday, said spokesman Greg TenEyck.
Natural Selection also plans to resume processing spinach, even as one of its plants is shut down because it is under investigation. So far, testing at that plant by the FDA, California Department of Health Services and independent auditors has not turned up any trace of E. coli , said Natural Selection spokeswoman Samantha Cabaluna.
The company will probably not have spinach available until early to mid-November, after it switches to winter operations in Yuma, Ariz., Cabaluna said.
As about two dozen investigators carried on the search for the outbreak's source, food safety officials reiterated yesterday that they may never find a specific cause. So far, health officials have confirmed the presence of the outbreak strain of E. coli in seven bags of spinach provided by victims. Lot codes on at least three bags indicate they contained spinach washed and packaged on the same day, Aug. 15, Reilly said.
All the bags contained Dole conventional spinach.
