When Kristine Gasbarre Qaderi was a digital health editor, one of her daily beats was food and product recalls: the packaged items and consumer goods that are pulled from shelves over safety or contamination concerns. To uncover the latest items to be labeled a health threat, Gasbarre Qaderi meticulously sifted through dozens of obscure government and corporate websites, scanning the day's array of recalls of edible items, prescription drugs, and products ranging from baby toys to RVs. Only a fraction of those recalls ever made it into her stories. There were simply too many for her to report all of them.
"It made me realize this was information that, while public, was inaccessible," she says. There was no centralized list, no clearinghouse of information. Consumers could easily miss that the food in their fridge or the stroller in their trunk (not to mention the car itself) had been deemed unsafe.
That's why Gasbarre Qaderi quit her job to create a one-stop shop of all the recall-related news consumers need. The Krissy List, a newly launched daily email, sends essential information about just-announced recalls straight to subscribers' inboxes.
We spoke with Gasbarre Qaderi about the most common products to have problems once they go on sale, whether recalls are on the rise, and how she finds this news that often passes the rest of us by.
KCM: What would most people be surprised to learn about product recalls?
Kristine Gasbarre Qaderi: For starters, how many there are. There are often more than a dozen per day, sometimes two dozen, and they come out typically six days a week. And while a big story like the lettuce outbreak might get coverage, most consumer-facing product recalls don’t.
It's also important to know that there are different classes of recalls, and not all of them are potentially dangerous. Class I is for something that could cause real and permanent harm to someone. Class II is something that could cause temporary harm, like a foodborne illness. And Class III is something that wouldn't likely cause harm, such as a package that was mislabeled with the wrong weight.
What kinds of products do you tend to see recalled most?
In addition to food, it’s automotive, drugs — over-the-counter and prescription — and medical devices. But it’s not just those categories. It’s also apparel, pet goods, home goods, electronics. Baby items, like your walker or bassinet or stroller. You see a lot of furniture that can collapse, creating a safety hazard for children.
How hard would it be for the average person to find this information?
I look at 60-plus sources a day, and it’s a lot of back channels, not just the FDA recall page. For example, I look at the biggest supermarket chain in every state and what they’re reporting. I think most Americans would be hard-pressed to do that once or twice a day. So it's not that the information isn't out there, it's that it's not something a lot of people have time to go and find.
It seems like there are a lot of recalls in the news lately. Is it just our imagination?
While the number of recalls is on pace with previous years, I've seen figures that say it's higher by volume this year than in past years, especially in pharmaceuticals and medical devices. In other words, when a product needs to come off the market, more of it is coming off the market than before, and that may result in greater press coverage.
But it's also that the reason for recalls is evolving. Until early last year, the most common reason for a food recall to be announced was “an undeclared ingredient,” often because one of the major allergens wasn't listed on the packaging. But I've noticed that it's far more frequent now that “foreign matter” is the cause. If you've ever seen a recall announcement and thought, But how on earth does glass get into a popsicle?, it's because equipment or packaging breaks down and things find their way into the food.
My theory — and I've heard food safety experts confirm this — is that quality checks are down. When the economy is suffering and workforces get smaller, quality is one of the first places where corners are cut.
Has doing this work changed how you shop?
I'm probably the most informed person in the country about the state of recalls, and I feel that everybody has a right to this information, especially when people's budgets are tighter. Parents are trying to feed their children healthy food, and what a nightmare to think that it might be unsafe in some way. I want people going to the grocery store feeling empowered, not scared, and I want these emails to be something concrete that anyone can use to feel safer.
