In the back of my mind I kind of know restaurants are disgusting, I just choose not to think about it because I need to eat. Even a fancy “A” rated restaurant has some seriously gross stuff going on. Restaurant grades are dolled out based on health code violations; an A restaurant can have no more than 13 points in their most recent inspection. For example, if a restaurant is found to have an ill employee in the kitchen they receive 10 points for the violation. So, an inspector can go to a restaurant, witness a sick person handling your food and that restaurant can still earn a top health rating. If you were eating while reading this article, go ahead and stop right now.
As gross as some aspects of eating out can be, a lot happens to your food before it even gets to your favorite restaurant. But don’t worry, Senator Chuck Schumer has added better food regulation to his plate.
Senator Schumer is asking the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to review its policies and increase the amount of inspections to food distributors after discovering nasty stuff going on at a food distribution company based in Greenpoint. As reported in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, the New Yung Wah Trading Co. headquarters, located at 311 Richardson Street, has big vermin control and storage problems at some of its warehouses.
According to various reports the FDA visited a warehouse in Pennsylvania multiple times in October and found violations in the way food was prepared and packed so extensive that it caused food to be contaminated with “filth” and it was deemed “injurious to health.” They also found birds flying around the warehouse, dead rodents, and rat poop near flour and meat. Seriously. I think my favorite gross tidbit was the discovery of a rodent nest in a pallet of pineapples. Oh, and they also found rodent poison strewn about with no effort made to make sure it wasn’t contaminating food. I guess that would account for all the dead rodents spotted throughout the warehouse.
Schumer is proposing that the FDA make yearly inspections to problem facilities and create an online database where the public can track violations. Do you think yearly inspections will be enough to curb these gross and numerous violations? Let us know in the comments!