Section A·Page 6
The University Daily Kansan
Tuesday, August 26, 1997
Common sense, good hygiene prevent food poisoning
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Alfalfa sprouts contaminated by E. coli. Hepatitis-tainted strawberries in school lunches. Children sick from unpasteurized apple juice, and 140 people struck by bacteria-laden raw oysters.
The recall of 25 million pounds of hamburger is merely the latest scare about dangerous germs contaminating Americans' food. Keeping hamburger safe mostly takes common sense — cook meat thoroughly. But consumer advocates say a larger threat may come from germs lurking in unexpected places
— that slip through the government's patchwork of safety rules.
"Almost monthly we are seeing new causes for concern based on food problems," said Caroline
Smith DeWaal of the advocacy group Center for Science in the Public Interest. "We don't have a government system to fix those problems."
But the government and food makers are preparing to fight back. The Food and Drug Administration is considering putting warning labels on unpasteurized apple juices and ciders — perhaps as early as this week — after dozens of children were sickened by E. coli that got into one trendy brand. Pasteurization kills potentially deadly E. coli bacteria.
Scientists are investigating whether irradiating beef, exposing it to radiation, could kill E. coli and other disease-causing micro-organisms, and whether irradiating fresh berries would kill cyclospora, a parasite that sickened about 1,400
Americans who ate Guatemalan raspberries this spring.
Manufacturers are beginning to advertise to consumers when they adopt a safety program called HAACP — an ungainly acronym that means companies check for contamination repeatedly as ingredients move from harvest to grocery store.
The latest scare comes after 16 Colorado residents got E. coli from hamburgers processed by Hudson Foods Inc. The Agriculture Department says an outside slaughterhouse likely was the source, but Hudson recalled a massive 25 million pounds of hamburger after investigators discovered the company used leftover raw meat from one day in the next day's production, potentially causing a chain of contamination.
"Almost monthly we are seeing new causes for concern based on food problems."
Caroline Smith DeWaal public health advocate
Although the U.S. food supply is considered the world's safest, about 9,000 Americans still die every year from food poisoning. A New Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study says between 6 million and 80 million Americans are sickened each year — a good count isn't possible because many mild cases go unreported.
The easiest protection is good hygiene, says FDA food safety chief Janice Oliver. She's amazed by people who admit they had no idea fruits and vegetables should be washed before eating.
The new CDC study says the biggest food poisoner — a bug called campylobacterium that lurks in unpasteurized milk and raw poultry — particularly strikes young men with poor food preparation skills. In other words, they don't wash their hands between putting raw poultry on the grill and setting the table.
Yet thorough cooking and cleaning only help so much. The Clinton administration has asked Congress for $43 million to begin, in October, hiring more government food
inspectors and researching better poisoning prevention.
Produce growers already are searching for more hygienic ways to grow everything from lettuce to alfalfa sprouts, both of which have sickened Americans with E. coli. To prevent another outbreak, officials need to know if something as simple as using manure as fertilizer — common among organic growers — was to blame.
But some foods may simply be too hazardous to allow in this country, said consumer advocate De Waal. She points to frozen strawberries that gave about 150 Michigan schoolchildren hepatitis A last spring. They were secretly imported from Mexico, where investigators are probing whether they were irrigated with dirty water.
Army official may stand trial on charges of sexual misconduct, including rape
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The six women who brought sexual misconduct allegations against the Army's top enlisted man were described yesterday by prosecutors as heroes and attacked by the defense as opportunists.
"Don't let them down," lead prosecutor Lt. Col. Michael Child said of the women, as he urged that Sgt. Maj. of the Army Gene McKinney be ordered to stand trial.
But defense lawyer Lt. Col James Gerstenlauer said McKinney was an outstanding soldier who has served the country proudly and was confronted by baseless allegations.
Charles Gittins, McKinney's civilian defense lawyer, said his client didn't get to be the Army's top enlisted man by acting inappropriately.
Gittins said.
"To become sergeant major of the Army he had to undergo an extensive background check."
To Child, McKinney was a manipulative man using his powerful position to prey on vulnerable women.
The Fort McNair hearing ended with both sides summing up their cases. Now a hearing officer must consider whether McKinney should be court-martialed or returned to his Pentagon post.
Col. Robert Jarvis, the presiding officer, has 15 days to make his recommendation.
But given the length of the hearing, which began two months ago and included testimony from more than 30 witnesses. Jarvis could get an extension. The transcript runs thousands of pages.
Jarvis's recommendation would go to Col. Owen Powell, the next senior officer in the chain of command.
would be made by Maj. Gen Robert F. Foley, commander of the Military District of Washington.
The final decision on whether the case should go forward
Jarvis also can recommend revising the charges, and Child urged him to add rane to the list.
The first of the women to testify against McKinney, Sgt. Christine Roy, said she reluctantly had sex with McKinney when she was nearly eight months pregnant. The prosecutor said that incident amounted to rape.
Gerstenlauer said the recommendation by Child was offensive. He said there was no credible evidence to corroborate the charges by Sgt. Roy.
McKinney is the first black sergeant major of the Army.
If a court martial is ordered, Gittins has said he would file a motion saying McKinney was a victim of discrimination.
To support that claim he said he would offer evidence that
high-ranking white officers were allowed to quietly retire after doing the same things McKinney is accused of.
McKinney, who has served in the Army for nearly 30 years, has asked to be allowed to retire.
In their summations, the lawyers on both sides offered starkly different views of the accused and his accusers.
Child said the six women who came forward knew they would face harsh examination of their personal lives.
"They knew exactly what they had to expect if they came forward and they came forward anyway," he said. "They're heroes, they saw wrong and they were willing to report it."
"The government would have you believe women don't make false allegations." Gittins said.
"Baseless allegations like these, motivated by the basest of motives, only destroy discipline, breed timid supervisors and encourage contempt for the system," Gerstenlauer said.
Number of applicants for private colleges down
The Associated Press
ST. PAUL, Minn. — More affluent students are abandoning private colleges in favor of their cheaper, public counterparts, researchers said.
The big, brand-name schools such as Harvard and Princeton still pack in the well-to-do. But smaller, four-year private liberal arts schools are increasingly losing their full-paying customers to public universities, according to "The Student Aid Game," a book to be published in November.
"The idea was always that you would create these great institutions that would then be accessible to anybody who had the motivation and talent to go. That kind of fundamental promise of higher education is really being thrown into question." said co-author Michael McPherson, president of the private Macalester College in St. Paul.
McPherson and co-author Morton Schapiro found that about 38 percent of college freshmen from the richest families enrolled in public institutions in 1994, compared with 31 percent in 1980. The richest families were those making more than $200,000 a year.
For upper-middle income families — those who earned between $100,000 and $200,000 — freshman enrollment at public schools rose to 48 percent in 1994 from 42 percent in 1980, they found.
Consumers are making less of a distinction in the relative quality of public and private educations, partly because of the acceptance of well-publicized best-buy guides. McPherson said.
"Money" magazine's annual college ratings due out in September, for example, rank the University of Florida 80 notches above Dartmouth as a best buy.