The Survive and Thrive Boomer Guide

Huge ground beef recall expanded to 12 million pounds

JBS Tolleson Inc. is recalling an additional 5.1 million pounds raw beef products, which were produced and packed from July 26 to Sept. 7, because the meat may be contaminated with Salmonella Newport. This is an expansion of the Oct. 4 recall in which 6.9 million pounds of raw beef products were recalled.

The USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service is concerned that some ground beef may be frozen and in consumers’ freezers. These products should be thrown away or returned to the place of purchase.

The raw beef items, including ground beef, have the establishment number “EST. 267” inside the USDA mark of inspection. These items were shipped to a retail locations and institutions nationwide. The affected brands include Kroger, Cedar Farms, and Showcase.

President George H.W. Bush: Not a consumer champion

As President George H.W. Bush is being positively eulogized, it’s important to remember that Bush, as often is the case with most Republican, was more interested in helping business interests than consumers.

Here are some examples of how the Bush administration, and the Republican Party, have failed consumers:

But by and large, [George H.W.] Bush was an establishment president. This meant that he did not fundamentally try to fix the inequities wrought by the American model. He escalated, for instance, Reagan’s War on Drugs – leading to the mass incarceration of African-Americans, a blight that still ails the country to this day. The New Statesman

President Bush signed the biggest rewrite of U.S. bankruptcy law in a quarter century, making it harder for debt-ridden Americans to wipe out their obligations. NBC News

UDSA needs to do more to protect the public from Salmonella contamination in meat and poultry, consumer group says

The U.S. Department of Agriculture needs to exercise its authority under the law to set and enforce more rigorous standards to protect consumers from Salmonella contamination in meat and poultry, a report by the Consumer Federation of America recommends.

Illnesses from Salmonella in the United States have remained about the same during the past decade. However, in the European Union they’ve declined dramatically during the same period, to less than half what they once were, due to a farm-to-fork Salmonella control initiative launched in 2003.

In the last few months, a rash of Salmonella outbreaks linked to meat and poultry has caused hundreds of illnesses.

Do you like fruitcake? I do

Photo: SMC

I love fruitcake, especially the English-style fruitcake that I learned to make when I lived in Australia.

It was quite a learning experience. My first teaching job was at East Sydney Girls High School and I was teaching cooking.

I had to demonstrate to the kids how to make fruitcake, the traditional cake of the country, like England, where it’s what most people have for a wedding cake.

New non-stick chemical nearly as toxic as the ones it replaced, EPA says

GenX, introduced a decade ago as a “safer” alternative for the non-stick chemicals PFOA and PFOS, is nearly as toxic to people as what it replaced, according a recently released Environmental Protection Agency study. 

The EPA published a draft toxicity review for GenX and a related compound called PFBS, both part of the PFAS family of chemicals. The Environmental Working Group’s analysis of EPA’s assessment shows that very tiny doses of GenX and PFBS could present serious health risks, including harm to prenatal development and the immune system, liver, kidney, or thyroid.

“It is alarming that, 12 years after DuPont, 3M and other companies, under pressure from EPA, began phasing out PFOA and PFOS, we find that replacements like GenX are nearly as hazardous to human health,” said David Andrews, Ph.D., senior scientist at the EWG.

What do the new labels for romaine lettuce mean?

Romaine lettuce growers are beginning to label their lettuce with information on where it was grown and the date it was harvested

The labels are voluntary, so if the romaine lettuce isn’t labeled, don’t buy it, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration advises.

The FDA has indicated that the romaine lettuce involved in the most recent E. coli outbreak was likely harvested from central and northern California growing regions. However, production in that area has now over and most domestic romaine production has moved to Arizona for the winter.

Baby boomers focus on the holidays and life’s ups and downs

Meryl Baer of Six Decades and Counting went to her town’s official party to usher in the holiday season, a Saturday evening with a holiday parade and block party. It rained early in the day, but by the 5 p.m. start, no rain fell and the temperature was almost balmy. Fire engines, school bands, home-made floats, and enthusiastic spectators created a festive atmosphere. 

Other boomer bloggers are writing about:

• Creating a calendar for the holidays to help you enjoy the time and stress less over it.
• Researching whether a charity you’ve heard about it a good choice.
• Recounting stories of holidays past.
• Contemplating our life’s journey.
• Being a caregiver to someone who is chronically ill.

Baer writes about these articles for the Best of Boomer Blogs #575. Click here to get the links to the articles. And, be sure to join in the conversations. Boomer bloggers love to hear from readers.

Copyright 2018, Rita R. Robison, Consumer Specialist

What to do about the Marriott data breach

Photo: Justefrain

About 500 million Marriott customers appear to have had their credit or debit card numbers stolen four years ago.

These consumers are at risk for existing account fraud and should consider requesting a new card. All consumers should check their monthly credit card and bank statements.

“The Marriott breach raises serious questions about Marriott’s data security and its response,” said Mike Litt, consumer campaigns director for U.S. PIRG, a public interest organization. “For starters, how did Marriott’s data breach go unnoticed for four years?”

Two more blood pressure medications recalled due to possible cancer risks

Teva Pharmaceuticals is recalling all lots of combination tablets featuring the drugs amlodipine and valsartan and another combination drug featuring amlodipine, valsartan, and hydrochlorothiazide due to an impurity detected.

The impurity is N-nitroso-diethylamine or NDEA, which has been classified as a probable human carcinogen, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

The combination tablets are used for treating high blood pressure. Teva hasn’t received any reports of adverse events signaling a potential link or exposure to valsartan, according to a statement from Teva posted by the FDA.

Have the interest rates gone up on your credit cards?

Many consumers sign up for credit cards without paying too much attention to the interest rate. They may not notice that the credit card issued by a retailer has a much higher interest rate than one they’d get from Visa or Master Card.

In the past several years, credit card interest rates and debt have risen substantially, increasing consumer costs by tens of billions of dollars each year. For example, interest rate on credit card accounts rose steadily from 12.95 percent in 2013 to 16.46 percent in August 2018, an increase of 27 percent, according to Federal Reserve Board data. The credit card interest rate is the highest in this century.

These interest rate increases are going to make holiday purchases with credit cards more expensive. Consumers with high credit card debt levels should be cautious about increasing their debt during the holiday season, said Steve Brobeck, a senior fellow at the Consumer Federation of America.