The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) will propose amendments to its avian leukosis rule, an official with FSIS told attendees of the Delmarva Poultry Industry (DPI) National Meeting on Poultry Health, Processing, and Live Production.
Rachel Edelstein, assistant administrator, FSIS Office of Policy and Program Development, said the agency had earlier intended to publish the amendments in August, but those plans got postponed due to “other priorities” that FSIS was facing. She said the proposed new rules will still be published soon, but she did not say exactly when that will be.
The proposal, according to Edelstein, will include:
An amendment to the poultry products inspection regulations to rescind the regulation that requires condemnation of poultry carcasses affected with any of the forms of avian leukosis complex.
Provisions that avian leukosis lesions would be addressed by the current regulation that provides for any organ or other carcass part affected with tumors to be trimmed and the unaffected parts of the carcass to be inspected and passed.
The rescinding of the regulation that requires young chicken slaughter establishments operating under the New Poultry Inspection System (NPIS) to provide a location along the production line at which an FSIS inspector may inspect the first 300 carcasses of each flock together with associated viscera for leukosis and the regulation that prescribes inspection procedures for avian visceral leukosis in NPIS young chicken slaughter establishments.
Edelstein, who was appointed to her current role within FSIS in 2012, said the agency will keep the poultry industry “up to date” regarding when the avian leukosis rule amendments will be published.
Edelstein spoke at the DPI meeting, which was held virtually, on September 29.
See other coverage from 2020 DPI national meeting
Follow these links for more WATTPoultry.com coverage of the Delmarva Poultry Industry (DPI) 55th National Meeting on Poultry Health, Processing, and Live Production.
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