Egg Recall expansion may be needed as the head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said Monday more egg recalls may be necessary in the face of salmonella outbreaks. The new recalls, if they are issued, would follow "the largest egg recall in recent history," more than half a billion eggs, FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg told CNN.
Hamburg said because of the way the U.S. food distribution system is set up, "You start with a couple of farms in Iowa and you can get nationwide (disease) exposure."
Hillandale Farms of Iowa said Friday it was recalling more than 170 million eggs. Another Iowa producer, Wright County Egg, had recalled 380 million eggs after the FDA linked them to a nationwide salmonella outbreak that has sickened hundreds of people, CNN reported.
The report said the FDA was talking to the egg producers to get access to their records.
Hamburg said Sunday, "There's no question these farms involved in the recall were not operating with the standards of practice we consider responsible."
She said about 1,000 people were sickened by the outbreak that federal regulators traced back to the two producers.
In a statement Sunday, Hillandale Farms said, "We are devastated that our eggs have been implicated in making people sick. We have never had a product recall in our 45-year history, and it flies in the face of our mission to provide wholesome, nutritious food for the American public. We regret that anyone might have become ill, and the concern and disruption this has caused our customers."
CNN said the eggs were shipped to 17 states: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Nevada, Minnesota, Missouri, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Utah, Washington and Wisconsin.
