In Nanny-State News: US Plans Ban Of Raw Warm Water Oysters

Because 15 people die each year

NYT wrote:A federal effort to ban the sale of raw oysters harvested during the warm months along the Gulf Coast has kicked up a hurricane of opposition from oystermen and members of Congress and threatened to derail a signature food-safety initiative by the Obama administration.

At issue is how far the federal government should go to save the lives of 15 people each year who die from eating contaminated raw oysters. [...]

I get the point--I really do--but I have to say that 15 people dying a year purely because they ate something does give me pause about eating that something. I don't want to be one of the 15. Or even one of the others who get violently ill and don't die.

I have happily eaten raw oysters all my adult life--I love them--but I think there may be increasing reason not to. (I have to admit my opinion is pushed that way also by my environmental scientist niece, who is studying oysters in the Chesapeake Bay, and says based on what she's learned that anybody should have his head examined who eats raw oysters anymore.)

I'm not against the ban.

The oyster guy who used to be at Fulton's said that he would never eat a warm water oyster, just too great a chance of getting sick. That being said, I think we should all have the right to decide whether or not to take the risk.

NYT wrote:Most people can eat raw oysters contaminated with vibrio without problem. Those with compromised immune systems — some of whom do not even know they have health issues — are at gravest risk.

You could apply this same reasoning to raw egg, sushi, any number of things. There are caveats on raw oysters (and sushi, etc) that say you shouldn't eat them if you have a compromised immune system. I'd have a problem if the risk was hidden in some way, but it isn't.

I hear cigarettes will kill you, too...says so on the package.

Some of the best oysters I've ever had have been fresh from the bay in Appalachicola, Florida - I believe it was in July. We were in a bar right on the water, it was crowded, and it seemed like everyone was consuming oysters by the dozens. No one seemed sick.

I've also been to areas of Maine, where it was posted that water testing suggested that eating shellfish from those waters wasn't safe, so no harvesting was allowed. I'm not sure why water testing isn't enough - I don't understand the rationale behind a ban on all oyster harvesting in warmer months.

jesteinf wrote:The oyster guy who used to be at Fulton's said that he would never eat a warm water oyster, just too great a chance of getting sick. That being said, I think we should all have the right to decide whether or not to take the risk.

I think it depends which analogy you pick--and reasonable people can pick different analogies.

On the one hand, you can pick an analogy to products we know aren't "good for you," from high-sugar cereals to cigarettes, in which it seems enough for government and the media to create high public awareness of the issue (including requiring warnings, if deemed necessary) and then let the marketplace take over.

On the other hand, you can pick an analogy to the discovery of e.coli in spinach. When the government discovered this, they banned the distribution and sale of spinach until they could be reasonably sure that the preponderance of the country's spinach was free of e.coli again. During this ban, was all spinach tainted? No, only some of it. If you had chosen to defy the warning and eaten spinach (assuming you could get any), chances are you would have been fine. Even so, I think (and my sense is that most people agree) that it was a prudent choice for government to make in protecting the public health.

riddlemay wrote:When the government discovered this, they banned the distribution and sale of spinach until they could be reasonably sure that the preponderance of the country's spinach was free of e.coli again.

Is that right? I know they recalled spinach, but I don't recall a full-on ban, in which spinach was unavailable anywhere.

Anyway, even if there was a temporary ban, I'm not sure that analogy holds. First, they're proposing a permanent ban. Second, unlike spinach, which is not supposed to contain e.coli, we're talking here about oysters -- which is one of those known risky foods that you either eat knowing the risk or you don't eat at all. As Mhays said, the risks aren't hidden here.

They stopped shipments from certain areas and producers, which resulted in shortages.

But there's no real comparison between a temporary action aimed at remediable QC issues, and deciding that something people have been perfectly okay choosing to do or not do on their own for centuries is now to be stopped, forever.

Mike G wrote:They stopped shipments from certain areas and producers, which resulted in shortages.

But there's no real comparison between a temporary action aimed at remediable QC issues, and deciding that something people have been perfectly okay choosing to do or not do on their own for centuries is now to be stopped, forever.

Exactly.

Mike G wrote:But there's no real comparison between a temporary action aimed at remediable QC issues, and deciding that something people have been perfectly okay choosing to do or not do on their own for centuries is now to be stopped, forever.

For most of my life I heard the rubric, "Only eat raw oysters in months with R in them." (I.e., not the "warm water" months of May, June, July and August.) Then, it seems like about ten or so years ago, the new conventional wisdom became, "That's an old wives' tale. You can eat raw oysters any time safely."

Who knew the old wives were right?

I get that nothing has actually changed from the way things always were. It was always unsafe to eat raw oysters in warm water months, yet they were sold for consumption. So why shouldn't that continue? I guess my answer is that as we learn more, we ought to apply that learning. There have always been bacteria, long before Joseph Lister discovered them. Lister learning about bacteria didn't make more bacteria happen. But it did make us know better what to do about bacteria. If the government has better knowledge about the dangers of warm water oysters than it had before, that's the reason for the government to act on its knowledge.

In other words, the informal system worked for 500 years until some expert disagreed with it, and now other experts want to ban it outright to fix the problem that didn't exist until their kind created it.

Peanuts kill 10X that many people. I understand that it's not a perfect analogy because oysters are deadly poison some of the time for most of the people, whereas peanuts are deadly poison all of the time for some of the people. (Of course, given the latter, peanut related deaths should be easier to predict and prevent; the fact that so many deaths happen nonetheless argues for a complete ban, no?) This is probably just New Englanders and West Coasters trying to hurt the Gulf and Chesapeake guys.

Everyone knows the risk, and the menus all have warnings now. I grew up on the Gulf eating Gulf oysters, have eaten oysters from around the world, and still think Apalachicola and Escambia and have some of the best. But even I never eat them in the summertime. The taste and texture suffers a lot and they are fairly likely to kick you in the gut.

I've had irradiated oysters. The radiation does not kill them, and significant taste tests show there's no effect on flavor. http://www.mdsg.umd.edu/issues/chesapea ... act79.html

But you should have the choice to eat non-zapped, just-pulled-from-the-mud fresh oysters in July at Acme or a low-country oyster roast in Savannah if you want to.

JeffB wrote:This is probably just New Englanders and West Coasters trying to hurt the Gulf and Chesapeake guys.

I'm not sure how they're defining "warm water" and whether that would ever, for some months of the year, include the East and West Coasts (doubt it - Massachusetts water is freezing in August). But, yes, I agree that this is a codification of the old "month-ending-in-R" rule disguised as a way to benefit one geographic sector of the industry. Doesn't hurt the East/West Coasts now that there's a Northerner in the White House either.

JeffB wrote:Peanuts kill 10X that many people. I understand that it's not a perfect analogy because oysters are deadly poison some of the time for most of the people, whereas peanuts are deadly poison all of the time for some of the people. (Of course, given the latter, peanut related deaths should be easier to predict and prevent; the fact that so many deaths happen nonetheless argues for a complete ban, no?)

Don't forget the great peanut recall of 2009.

-Dan

Mike G wrote:In other words, the informal system worked for 500 years until some expert disagreed with it, and now other experts want to ban it outright to fix the problem that didn't exist until their kind created it.

I'm under no illusion that I'm going to persuade anyone who isn't already inclined to support the ban (so far, I seem to be the only one here who sees merit in it), but there's one part of the above I don't understand. (It could be due to a lack of knowledge on my part.) You say that the experts (and their kind) created the problem; that it didn't exist until they created it. The problem is 15 people a year dying from eating warm water oysters. So, the experts created the Vibrio vulnificus bacteria in the warm water oysters? I know that can't be what you're saying, but I'm looking for another interpretation and not seeing it.

(edited due to a missing word: "it")

I think the point is that there is no significant scientific discovery that warrants this ban; there is no change in the level of danger, or in our understanding of the level of danger - just a decision that the number 15 is problematic. Also, there's no indication of what percentage of those deaths were related to the individual's behavior, (meaning, they knew they had an underlying condition where they were at high risk and ate oysters anyway.) although the person who rolled out the ban suggests that it has more to with controlling the behavior of people who are knowingly eating oysters when they are at risk than addressing a health risk to the general population.

Michael R. Taylor of the ISSC wrote:The at-risk population includes those with weakened immune systems or otherwise impaired health, including people with chronic diseases such as AIDS, cancer, kidney disease, diabetes, and alcohol abuse.
Reaching members of these high risk groups and persuading them to change their behavior with respect to shellfish consumption or other risk factors has proven extremely difficult, especially because many of the individuals are not even aware that they have a chronic disease. In fact, of the nearly 24 million people with diabetes, almost 6 million are not yet diagnosed. And another 57 million people have pre-diabetes. And when those with liver disease due to heavy drinking need to receive the message, education is that much harder.
It is thus not surprising that education aimed at behavior change has not achieved the 60% reduction in Vibrio cases to which the ISSC has aspired.

I found this interesting, as my thinking about this health issue is that the appropriate response is to increase availability of diagnostic testing for diabetes and pre-diabetes, and find a workable solution to alcohol abuse. But, as I have been reminded occasionally since I started trying to work on better school lunches, I'm no expert.

Mhays wrote:But, as I have been reminded occasionally since I started trying to work on better school lunches, I'm no expert.

I memorized a saying that I saw many years ago that said “An expert is one who knows more and more, about less and less, until they know absolutely EVERYTHING……about nothing”. It fits very well in the IT world.

Just came from New Orleans where this was big news. The ban is on hold pending more study. The longer version of this story in the print edition of the Times Picayune said that the FDA is still pushing for oysters intended to be eaten raw to be refrigerated within two hours instead of five, which is the current rule. This apparently will be tough on a lot of smaller oyster boats that don’t have any refrigeration.

Mhays wrote:I think the point is that there is no significant scientific discovery that warrants this ban; there is no change in the level of danger, or in our understanding of the level of danger...

On the first point (no change in the level of danger), no dispute. On the second point (no change in our understanding of the danger), I don't think it's quite so clear.

The article doesn't say either way. But even without an explicit statement of new evidence, my sense of the situation (based on the article) is that a growing awareness is happening that these warm water oysters are unsafe. Perhaps it's a cumulative thing. If 15 people die a year from them, that's 150 over the last decade. Maybe a consensus is growing at the FDA that enough people have died from this--and that enough is enough.

It's interesting that before the ban was put on hold, there were those here who considered it a purely political act, some kind of action of Northern and Eastern interests against Southern ones. But the temporary putting of the ban on hold is clearly a political act, motivated by the complaints of Gulf State interests and their legislators.

When we talk "nanny-state," we're usually talking about overzealous interests who want to ban the eating of Big Macs or trans-fats or suchlike. But eating a Big Mac or a bag of fries containing trans-fats won't kill you. (It takes a continuous diet of them to do that, along with other poor lifestyle choices.) This is in contrast to the warm water oysters. One plate of those, if it happens to be the wrong plate, can kill you. The FDA was right to act.

riddlemay wrote:When we talk "nanny-state," we're usually talking about overzealous interests who want to ban the eating of Big Macs or trans-fats or suchlike. But eating a Big Mac or a bag of fries containing trans-fats won't kill you. (It takes a continuous diet of them to do that, along with other poor lifestyle choices.) This is in contrast to the warm water oysters. One plate of those, if it happens to be the wrong plate, can kill you. The FDA was right to act.

Driving to the restaurant is more dangerous than eating the oyster, yet the government is not moving to ban automobiles.

In both cases, efforts are made to minimize the danger. In both cases, some sensible precautions are mandated. Yet in both cases, there is a certain amount of inherent risk and eventual fatalities that are unavoidable.

Of course, we weigh the risks against the benefits, as we do with many things. But why is it correct for the government to allow me to make my own risk assessment in one instance and not the other? Government is essentially saying, "We feel cars are worth 50,000 lives, so you can make your own call there, but warm water oysters aren't worth 15, so we're not allowing you to make that choice."

And you're okay with them making both that valuation and that determination?

Skydiving has killed an average of 24 people in the United States every year for the past six years. Is skydiving more valuable or necessary than warm water oysters? Should it be banned? If not, what's the distinction?

riddlemay wrote: On the second point (no change in our understanding of the danger), I don't think it's quite so clear.

I didn't get that impression from the article at all - what it appeared to me to be saying is that people who shouldn't be eating raw oysters in the first place are dying from them (or, more specifically, are dying from being weakened by the underlying conditions,) and the government is having difficulty controlling the behavior of these individuals, so their answer is to ban oysters outright, even if it means the overwhelming majority can eat them with little or no ill effects.

Nothing here says that we know something new about either the oysters or the disease; the only specific piece of information offered is that people who drink to the point of destroying their livers don't have good judgement about their diet. To address that problem in this fashion, we're going to have to ban a lot more than oysters.

Dmnkly wrote:And you're okay with them making both that valuation and that determination?

Your logic is airtight, Dom, but I'll tell you why I'm OK with the FDA making that valuation and determination.

There are many activities that carry risk. But no other food (that I'm aware of) in which simply eating one serving of it can kill you, even in the absence of any allergy to that food. (Maybe that Japanese blowfish thing, but those aren't legal here, are they? I confess ignorance on this, but I assume they are not.)

riddlemay wrote:

Dmnkly wrote:And you're okay with them making both that valuation and that determination?

Your logic is airtight, Dom, but I'll tell you why I'm OK with the FDA making that valuation and determination.

There are many activities that carry risk. But no other food (that I'm aware of) in which simply eating one serving of it can kill you. (Maybe that Japanese blowfish thing, but those aren't legal here, are they? I confess ignorance on this, but I assume they are not.)

Now, that's not so. All kinds of foods can be contaminated with e. coli, salmonella, listeria... deaths happen all of the time from single servings of other foods. And in far greater numbers. The risk may be greater from warm water oysters (proportionally speaking, relative to the number consumed), but a single apple can kill you. A single slice of bacon. A single cup of rice.

Why is the source of the contamination relevant? Just because the offending toxin floats into an oyster via the ocean rather than drifting into a contaminated pickle jar through the air or flowing into spinach's water source via runoff, that makes it fair game? In all cases, contamination and death occur. In all cases, it's unavoidable. It will and does happen.

Furthermore -- and I added this later so you might've missed it (slapping myself on the wrist for that) -- other non-essential leisure activities are far more dangerous than eating warm water oysters. As noted above, there are 24 annual fatalities from skydiving in the United States, and though I haven't looked it up I wager that far more people eat warm water oysters than jump out of planes. Is skydiving more valuable or essential than warm water oysters? If it isn't a matter of rate or number of fatalities -- which it demonstrably isn't -- what's the distinction?

And actually, though it requires a special license, very few places serve it and most if not all of the cleaning is done in Japan with the resultant product shipped here, fugu is legal in the United States.

Well, maybe I'm just a moldly old liberal, who believes that government actually does have a role to play in protecting the public health, compared to you young(er) whippersnappers and your newfangled libertarian ideas.

riddlemay wrote:Well, maybe I'm just a moldly old liberal, who believes that government actually does have a role to play in protecting the public health, compared to you young(er) whippersnappers and your newfangled libertarian ideas.

I'm not against government protecting public health. I just prefer not to be protected with measures that are draconian and arbitrarily applied

Regulate, oversee, test, tax, research new safety protocols, launch awareness campaigns... absolutely! But if you're going to ban something outright, it'd better be for a damn good and incredibly exceptional reason, and there are so many things we do that are no more essential and just as risky that I can't fathom any reason why warm water oysters should be singled out.

Last night I ate a half-dozen Fishers Island oysters at Shaw's. I figured Block Island Sound (the source of these oysters, north of the easternmost tip of Long Island, between Long Island and Connecticut) has waters that are cold enough to minimize the danger. Actually, when we went to Shaw's to join our friends, I had resolved to lay off the bivalves because of my newfound knowledge, but one and half Chopin martinis with blue cheese olives, along with the Northernly provenance of these particular oysters, induced me to go for it. I'm still here this morning, feeling fine. Will report in (if I'm still able to sit upright at the computer and see the keyboard) on my future progress.

As a side note, I noticed that none of the six or seven oyster choices on offer last night at Shaw's were from the Gulf. Score one for those evil Northern and Eastern interests?

So you made a deadly choice under the influence of alcohol?

Clearly more laws are needed to protect you.

Mike G wrote:So you made a deadly choice under the influence of alcohol?

Clearly more laws are needed to protect you.

Is it New York that has signs in bars prohibiting the serving of liquor to pregnant women? Or California? Either way (unless you disagree with that, as well), not all laws prohibiting the consumption of alcohol are bad. If we're talking general principals.

Obviously, anything can be taken too far. Everyone on this thread except me thinks the FDA took the oyster thing too far. But intervention itself, as a category--can we agree it has its place?

But we're not talking about a sign (clearly your problem is not lack of information). No, we clearly need laws preventing the consumption of oysters in establishments serving alcohol.

Everything's reasonable until it's unreasonable.