Vodela, J; Zervos, P; Deyrup, C; Sutton, R; O?Keefe, M; Pagan, D; Walker, H
Since 1967, the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), a public health regulatory agency of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has administered the NRP to collect data on chemical residues in domestic and imported meat, poultry and egg products. The plans include approved and unapproved veterinary drugs, pesticides, xenobiotics and other naturally occurring compounds that may appear in meat, poultry, and egg products and may pose potential risk to health. The FSIS, and the FDA, and the EPA are the key developers of the NRP. They work cooperatively with other organizations (eg., APHIS) to achieve mutual food safety objectives with respect to chemical residues. The FDA and EPA have statutory authority for setting tolerances and action levels for chemical residues and enforcing compliance. This authority is granted under the FFDCA and the FIFRA Act. The FSIS protects consumers by testing meat, poultry, and egg products for chemical residues and preventing adulterated products from entering the food supply. The FDA and EPA enforce compliance with their tolerances and action levels based on FSIS test results. In 2004, the FSIS Domestic Monitoring Plan sampled and tested 13 compound classes of drugs and pesticides, comprising approximately 59 chemicals. Of the 19,001 samples analyzed, 59 residue violations were found in 85 animals. The residue violations consisted of antibiotics (38), sulfonamides(5), avermectins/milbemycins(15), chlorinated hydrocarbons/chlorinated organophosphates( 3), carbadox (2), phenylbutazone(2), and flunixins(3). No residue violations were found for arsenicals, chloramphenicol, florfenicol, beta agonist and melenogestrol acetate. The chemical residues are usually concentrated in kidney, liver, or fat rather than muscle tissue. The FSIS sampling focuses on analyzing kidney and liver tissues, because most FDA tolerances are established for these tissues.