So now the Food and Drug administration says it thinks that bad jalopenos are behind the recent salmonella outbreak, which has made about 1,200 people sick.
A couple questions. Will the FDA compensate tomato farmers for losses they incurred due to their initial comments indicating that tomatos were to blame? Should they?
Beyond that, does the FDA do cost benefit analysis of their work? What is the cost to the U.S. economy of the losses to the tomato business? Is 1,200 people a major enough outbreak to spread the kind of alarm that they spread in this case (or did the jalopeno warning come soon enough to keep the outbreak down)? How major should the threat be for the FDA to release a national alert? Or is salmonella so serious that the FDA should warn us of even the slightest outbreak?
It can be quite serious. The assumption behind your series of questions is that this was a cry wolf. Our food supply, being what it is, is too sensitive to this sort of thing. Unless your willing to "go local" however (and spend the $ which that entails) then this sort of vigilance is required.
Oh, and to state the obvious, of course the tax payer should not "compensate" these poor, downtrodden, salt of the earth (industrial/investor) "farmers". Did not the "conservative" Republicans along with the Dem's just not vote in a massive farm giveaway a few months ago?
The apple growers lost their suit in the Alar case. On the assumption of rationality in the courts, the tomato growers have no hope if the apple growers got stiffed.
So I'm guessing there's a fifty-fifty chance.
Are "tomoatos" some strange genetic mutation between tomatoes, oats, and Cheerios? Are jalopenos people who drive around in jalopies?