The Society represents more than 42,000 microbiologists, including scientists and science administrators in academic, industrial and government institutions working in a variety of areas, including applied and environmental microbiology, food science, and medical microbiology.
Food irradiation is a safe and effective processing method for enhancing the safety of food.
Processing of foods by irradiation should be approved for use on ingredients and finished food products where there is a clear benefit to safety. Special labeling of irradiated foods is not scientifically-based because irradiation was misclassified as a food additive by rulemaking. There are substantial data supporting the effectiveness of irradiation for significantly reducing or eliminating microbial pathogens in raw meat. The doses that are proposed, i.e. 4.5 kGy for refrigerated and 7.0 kGy for frozen meat, should suffice for decreasing to undetectable populations the levels of bacterial foodborne pathogens normally associated with raw meats. However, there is no need to propose a minimum level of irradiation for meat or poultry products.