Subcommittee on Food Safety Committee on April 20th, 2009

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. McCain, you've talked about the importance of a role for both the company and the authority, and I think that's really important.

When we look back at SARS, we had shared understanding, shared responsibility, and shared lessons learned, so one of my greatest concerns is in looking at the chronology of events and seeing the repeated delay between the time information was gathered and the time it was shared. I'll provide some examples.

There was an increase in listeriosis cases in June and July; the first notification among partners was July 29. There were delays in sending samples. Toronto Public Health sent 11 samples on July 21, Ontario received them on July 22, that lab sent them on July 23, and they were received at the reference laboratory on July 24. The public health division detected an increase in reported cases of listeriosis on July 25. They requested additional data on July 28.

On July 21, the public health division asked the listeria reference laboratory to prioritize food samples submitted a week earlier. On the 24th.... As a result of the additional information entered by public health units retrospectively, public health identified 16 cases of listeriosis in the month of July.

Was there a delay in entering data? Was there not enough data entered? What is a reasonable time in which to enter data when the delay of a day can make a tremendous difference during an outbreak?

I'll give you a few more. On August 11, Ontario's central public health reported two open packages of meat cold cuts had tested positive for listeria. The Halton regional health department issued an advisory to local homes about a possible link. There was no other warning. CFIA informed the public health division and PHAC on August 13 that Maple Leaf was the manufacturer. Why was it two days later?

I could go on and on. Why didn't CFIA post a warning to its website until August 17, five days later? What other methods did it take to inform the public?

I have many other examples. I won't continue with them. I want to bring it back to you. You said there should be shared responsibility. You've talked about your responsibility. I'm wondering if you can comment on the delays that seemed to happen in many areas.

[Michael H. McCain]

I wish I could comment, Dr. Duncan, but I am not privy to those processes or dialogues or to the outcomes of them. Those types of exchanges and processes occur without our engagement.

Most of your examples were in July. The first notification we had was on August 8. On August 8 we were only asked if we could trace certain products, and that was the only thing we were asked: whether or not we had the ability to trace certain items. We obviously took steps to respond to that question.

The only thing we're able to respond to is factual information from the CFIA, which notified us on August 16 of a positive finding in product. We were notified, I believe, somewhere around 9 or 10 in the evening of August 16. I know I was personally notified about an hour later, and we began our recall procedures within minutes of being notified.

I would reiterate, though, that anything that could be done to shorten those timelines, which are very challenging, would be welcome.

Randy, maybe you'd comment on timelines.

Randy has had extensive experience on timelines in the United States in other circumstances.

[Randall Huffman]

Very briefly, I'll reiterate what I said earlier, which is that food-borne illness epidemiology is a challenging subject, and getting to root cause and collecting these types of data takes time. Certainly it might be instructive for this committee to contrast the timelines of this event to those in other recent large food-borne illness outbreaks. We would probably find examples of timelines that were actually much longer; there may also be instances of shorter timelines. Hopefully, we can learn from this.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Your time has expired, but thank you.

Mr. Anderson, five minutes.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

Mr. McCain, I'd like to go back to your statement to go over a couple of things.

On page 4--and you said this a couple of times--you note what happened last summer “was a failure of expectations not a failure of inspection.” And then you wrote:

We believe that the role for government should be built around four key principles:

1) Defining with detail, the requirements and expectations of an operator to deliver a strong and effective food safety program.

I'd like your opinion on whether the changes on April 1 have done that. The CFIA have made a number of changes there. We had a convoluted discussion about M200 and M205 earlier, but I understand that what was in the M205 sampling program is back in there, six times a year, and that's going to be part of that.

Your second statement is:

2) Building inspection and testing adequate to validate and verify compliance with the regulatory expectations, with tough accountability....

I would like to focus on that and ask you for your suggestions on how we can ensure corporate cooperation in the light, first of all, of our wish to ensure that a number of small operators continue to survive. That may not be your focus, but I think it should be part of the focus, especially of those of us who come from rural areas. I wonder how we can set a system in place that can deal with operations like yours, but with those that are much smaller as well.

Secondly, how do we do this? How do we build this inspection and testing structure, when you say that the failure really was not inspection? It sounds like there was enough inspection. Is it the analysis of the data? Is that what we need? Do we need more data? Do we need to analyze it differently? And if that's the case, what suggestions do you have for the CFIA in order to do that?

[Michael H. McCain]

With respect to your first question, the new listeria policy, we believe, is a very significant material step forward in capturing the learning from last year and does represent a global best practice requirement of the operators to implement a best practice environmental monitoring program.

Certainly, the M205 sampling protocol is built in there. But I think if you asked the scientific community, it is other features of that policy that will truly enhance food safety in the system, things like the requirement for operators to have sampling in the range of 10 food contact surfaces on a weekly basis.

I reiterate, the role of inspection is very important. We do believe that to implement this policy it will require the CFIA to probably include more resources. I think what's critical is that they focus those resources on the things that will actually enhance food safety, which, as Dr. Huffman referred to earlier, is making sure they analyze data, looking for patterns, looking for root cause analysis and so forth, as opposed to visual inspection in the plants, which can be misleading.

Is there anything you would add to that, Randy?

[Randall Huffman]

To your second question regarding support for smaller companies and smaller plants, certainly, that is a concern. One of the objectives we'll have as part of our leadership role in this area of food safety is to encourage and work with our peers in the industry to develop and share best practices. In fact, that is going on now through an industry working group that is developing a best practice document that provides guidance to not only companies of Maple Leaf size, but also to medium and small-sized operators. We think what's good for them will also be good for us and the industry at large, so we'll work cooperatively to get those messages out and assist where we can.

I've spent the last nine years doing just that at the American Meat Institute in Washington, working to share best practices across the industry, and there are some success stories we can build upon through that activity.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

As a follow-up, could you tell us the type and number of product and environment samples taken by your company and CFIA inspectors during an average day of inspection?

[Randall Huffman]

Is this what is required from April 1 going forward, as part of the new listeria policy?

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Yes, I guess so. I was curious about what it was like beforehand. And I was wondering what a normal inspection day would be under today's guidelines.

[Randall Huffman]

Prior to the recall in August, Maple Leaf had what would be considered a relatively aggressive sampling program for listeria in the environment. This includes two areas within the environment: the food contact surface; and the rest of the plant environment, which could take in the sides of equipment, the floors, the drains, the walls, the walkways, and so forth. So there are two separate sets of data collection. This information was being collected prior to the recall. In 2008, about 3,000 samples were collected before August.

In addition to that, there was some routine product testing at the request of customers and as part of our U.S. export requirements. But a minimal amount of product testing was taking place at that time. The expectation from CFIA at that time was also minimal. In fact, before August, there was, to our knowledge, no specific requirement to have an environmental program for food contact surfaces or for the general plant environment.

As part of the new policy that went into place April 1, these components are captured within the CFIA requirement. We view the recommendations as being quite appropriate. Maple Leaf has a program that includes daily testing of every one of our processing lines within our 24 ready-to-eat plants, together with weekly sampling. We take enough samples on the food contact surface to meet the new regulatory requirements. In addition, we test the environment, the non-food contact surfaces, as suggested in the CFIA policy. There is also a requirement to test product about six times per year, depending on the size of the facility and the risk level assigned to that product. These tests are taking place as we speak.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Thank you. I now have a better understanding of that.

What would be the difference between what you would have done before and what you would do now in the event of a positive sample being found?

[Randall Huffman]

Before August, the process, as recommended in global best practice, was to respond to each product-positive sample by remediating the site. This means aggressive sanitation, cleaning, and monitoring of the site. Our internal policy was to get three consecutive negatives after a positive on a food contact surface. So before August, this was what the Maple Leaf company did in that facility.

Today, however, we take a much more holistic approach to every positive finding. We dig deeper, and we're more rigorous in our evaluation of that root cause. We look for patterns in the data. We ask whether that particular site on that particular line has been positive in the past, and if so, we look for a linkage. What can we learn from the historical data? These are the types of things that are different today than they were then. We maintain the concept of following every positive site with consecutive negatives until we're certain that the product passing across that line is safe.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Thank you very much. We've had two full rounds.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

It's not six o'clock yet, Larry.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

It's not, Wayne, but if I start a round...we have four or five minutes left.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I don't think it matters. We have witnesses here for two hours, Larry. We need to get in all the questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

In order to be fair, we'll go around the room, and if you have a brief question, you can ask that specifically. I'm going to keep it to two minutes or less.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

On April 1, going forward, there was a new protocol established in the plants. We've been led to believe that when CFIA went in to do that new protocol, Maple Leaf informed the higher reaches of CFIA that these people doing the swabbing in the new line of testing were not consistent in their testing.

The reality is that CFIA is supposed to be monitoring the operators of the plant and not the other way around. As a result, those inspectors, or those people doing the work for CFIA, had to be recalled and retrained. What happened there?

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Mr. McCain.

[Michael H. McCain]

I think it's a very complex scientific policy that requires training and commitment to be implemented by both the industry and the CFIA. It's very fair and reasonable to expect that it's going to take a bit of time to implement across the country, but I think everybody is committed to accomplishing that.

There are other things, Mr. Chair, that we are doing in addition to what Randy talked about earlier regarding product quarantining, which we didn't do before, and executive oversight on each individual positive sample. Those other things are equally important to the success of our new program and illustrate that it's about the rigour as much as it is about the other attributes. That training and that commitment, Mr. Easter, I think are there for both the CFIA and the industry to implement.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Thank you.

I'll give the government side one question.

Make it very brief, Mr. Storseth, please.

[Brian Storseth, Conservative, Westlock—St. Paul, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I can fit in a couple of questions in a shorter time than Mr. Easter fits in one.

Mr. McCain, I want to thank you for coming and being so abrupt, open, and honest with us. I'm sure you're aware of the independent investigator who has been appointed by the government, Ms. Sheila Weatherill, former president and CEO of the Capital Health Region. In 2003 she was named one of Canada's most influential women by Maclean's Magazine. As well, in 2003 the Edmonton Capital Health Region was named number one in all of the 57 health regions in Canada.

I'll ask all of my questions at once. Have you had an opportunity to meet with Ms. Weatherill yet? Has Maple Leaf turned over all the records and documents that she has requested? In your opinion, is Ms. Weatherill doing a good job? Do you agree that the Prime Minister's appointment of Ms. Weatherill is a positive development in getting to the bottom of this?

[Michael H. McCain]

We made a commitment to collaborate and cooperate with all investigations or any process that will enhance food safety in this country. Indeed, we have, at her request and ours, met with her and her staff on several occasions. We have turned over all the information that she's requested. We believe that as much as this process is a valued process, that one is as well. I recognize her credentials and respect them immensely. I have every confidence that she will fulfill her mandate.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Thank you very much, gentlemen, for being here today. I think a lot of questions were answered. We certainly appreciate you taking the time out.

We do have another hearing. For the members of the committee, with your indulgence, CFIA could be ready to go by 6:15.

I understand there's going to be lunch or dinner served. If you could grab that, then we'll get going.

The meeting is suspended.