Food and Drug Administration recalls pork products due to swine fever

MANILA, Philippines — The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has ordered the recall and seizure of all processed pork meat products from countries suspected to be affected by the African Swine Fever (ASF) virus.

Under FDA Order 2019-046, the agency ordered all importers, distributors, retail outlets and other dealers to immediately recall all pork meat products imported from countries suspected to be affected by the ASF virus.

“Food business operators, importing, distributing, offering for sale and/or donating these banned products shall be prosecuted for violation of the FDA Act of 2009, the food safety act of 2013 and other rules and regulations on food safety,” the order read.

The FDA also directed its food-drug regulation officers under its field regulatory operations office and regulatory enforcement unit officers to seize all imported pork meat products for distribution, sale, transfer and/or donation, which are found during monitoring.

In a separate advisory to the general public, the FDA reiterated the temporary ban on the importation, distribution and sale of these products from countries suspected affected by the ASF virus.

Among these countries are Belgium, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Czech Republic, China, Hungary, Latvia, Moldova, Mongolia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Sambia, South Africa, Ukraine and Vietnam.

“The public is advised to exercise extreme caution in purchasing and consuming processed pork meat products and is advised to only consume those that are sourced from countries not listed above,” the FDA said.

It said that it currently does not allow the registration of processed pork meat products from the listed countries.

“A heightened post-marketing surveillance and audit is being conducted on all concerned and covered establishments to ensure full compliance with the FDA order and to hold violators liable,” the FDA said.

On Monday, Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol asked the FDA to recall processed meat products with cutoff date of August 2018.

“Any other products shipped in after August 2018 when we issued the ban should be recalled from the market,” Piñol told reporters.

He directed the Bureau of Animal Industry to monitor and check pet stores that sell dog and cat food products using animal meat byproducts from ASF-affected countries.