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Gulf oystermen fear short-time ban means end of business

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BY JEFF HOUCK

THE TAMPA TRIBUNE

Published: October 30, 2009

TAMPA - Florida's oyster and shellfish industry is reeling 10 days after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration abruptly announced plans to restrict oyster sales during warm-weather months.

Starting in spring 2011, sales of fresh, live oysters from Texas, Louisiana and Florida will be prohibited from May to October unless they are processed after harvest, an FDA official told the Interstate Shellfish Sanitation Conference last week.

According to FDA data, vibrio vulnificus infections cause an average of 30 illnesses each year in the United States, from which 15 people die. In Florida during 2007-08, there were eight oyster-related vibrio illnesses and four deaths, according to the state health department. Vibrio deaths usually occur among people with underlying chronic conditions, such as AIDS, cancer, kidney disease, diabetes and alcohol abuse.

The shellfish conference was formed in 1982 to promote sanitation by coordinating among state and federal agencies, the industry and academic researchers. It has worked for a decade to reduce the number of illnesses and deaths from vibrio vulnificus, and planned to implement new rules that would require refrigeration on oyster boats and better storage after harvest. For eight years, the FDA has approved those efforts.

In his speech Oct. 17, Michael Taylor, senior advisor to FDA commissioner Margaret A. Hamburg, commended the organization for its efforts, but said the decline in illnesses has been "minimal."

"We no longer believe that measures which reduce the hazard but fall well short of eliminating it ... are sufficient to meet the purpose of the regulation," he said.

Taylor cited a 2003 move by California to prohibit unprocessed Gulf Coast oysters from entering the state. From 1991 and 2001, California had 40 deaths from vibrio vulnificus. After the ban, the number dropped to zero.

Tommy Ward, an oysterman and co-owner of Buddy Ward & Son's Seafood & Trucking in Apalachicola, attended the conference in Manchester, N.H. He didn't like how Taylor delivered the news. The way he heard it: There's a new administration in the White House. We have the money and political power to do this whether you like it or not, and no matter the cost.

"His tone ... was unbelievable," Ward said. "I thought I was in a communist country."

The FDA's change will mean the raw oysters he harvests during the ban months must be frozen. High pressure treatment, mild heat and low-dose gamma radiation are also options for post-harvest processing.

The shellfish organization voted unanimously after Taylor's speech against supporting the FDA's new regulation, said David Heil, assistant director of the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services' aquaculture division. Shellfish industry representatives can comment, but not vote, on issues.

The organization will not oppose the FDA's proposal, but it also will not help with enforcement, Heil said.

Part of that refusal is due to a lack of communication from the federal agency, members said. The FDA had opportunities to have the new requirements reviewed and discussed during shellfish conference committee and task force meetings, but did not do so.

The conference also voted to reprimand the FDA for violating an agreement the agency signed with the conference over how rules would be debated and implemented.

"I've been going to these meetings since they started in 1982 and I've never seen anything like it," Heil said.

The FDA proposal is scientifically flawed, said Kevin Begos, executive director of the Franklin County (Fla.) Oyster & Seafood Task Force.

"There is no such thing as zero-risk in life, and people have the right to eat a simple, natural food that humans have enjoyed for thousands of years," Begos said

FDA regulators who work with the shellfish group told Begos that they had no more than two to three days' notice from Washington about the announcement. Taylor told the group after the speech that the changes have been in the works for about two weeks.

"This was a political move," Begos said. "We were told by FDA officials we work with that this would not have happened without a new administration."

On Wednesday, Florida Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson and Rep. Allen Boyd Jr., D-North Florida, sent a letter to Hamburg asking that the FDA reverse its decision, which they said was made unilaterally and without input from industry and other stakeholders.

"The FDA's decision to impose new Draconian standards that threaten the very existence of an oyster industry along the Gulf coast is unprecedented and unwarranted," their letter said.

"If they can do this to something that causes 1/10th of 1 percent of all food-borne illnesses, what's to say they won't go after raw clams, peanuts and sushi?" Begos said.

Oyster harvesters also fear the ban will prompt consumers to avoid oysters year-round. Taylor's statement during his Oct. 17 speech that there is no taste difference between a fresh and frozen oyster struck many as misleading.

Chris Hastings of the Hot Hot Fish Club restaurant in Birmingham, Ala., said in a prepared statement that such a declaration was akin to saying there is no difference between a frozen strawberry and a fresh one.

Vicky Dodds, catering and day restaurant manager at Skipper's Smokehouse Restaurant and Oyster Bar in Tampa, said extra costs incurred by processing oysters would have to be passed on to customers. A dozen oysters on the half-shell currently sell for about $9.99. She guessed that amount would rise at least another 50 percent during the affected months.

"Being that we have the words 'oyster bar' in our name, we would not be oyster-free during those months," Dodds said. "We won't be oysterless."

Billy Dalton, right, releases a load Apalachicola Bay oysters onto the deck of his boat as his son Billy Jr. culls the keepers from the pile. Oysters longer than three inches are kept for sale, smaller ones thrown back in the bay for another day.

Tina McClain shucks oysters Thursday at Buddy Ward and Sons Seafood near Apalachicola.

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