Monday, 26 November 2018

Let's Call The US UK Trade Deal Off

The last time someone came back from a meeting in Europe and announced a great deal we were at war with them within a year but Theresa May may not have been waving a bit of paper but she did say she had got us a great deal although on the other side of the Atlantic President Trump put down his cheeseburger long enough to say that the as it stands, the deal means the UK wouldn't be able to trade with the USA. 
Labour MP Tulip Siddiq, described Mr Trump's remarks as a "major blow" for the prime minister, saying '"Even Donald Trump, not the sharpest tool in the box, knows this deal is a bad deal' but i wouldn't be so quick Tulip as no deal with the USA means we won't have to take their dodgy food.
What has been a long standing disagreement, the standards of food in the USA is lower than in Europe which is why the majority of their meat has been banned in the EU since 1996 but any agreement would mean the UK accepting the imports of products such as hormone-treated US beef, chlorine-washed chickens and genetically modified cereals.
Last year, Wilbur Ross, the US commerce secretary, insisted the UK would have to accept American food standards if it was to secure a trade deal but a poll by the consumer association Which, three quarters of the British population is opposed to it.
Recently published analysis by the British food and farming pressure group Sustain, found that the incidence of food poisoning in the US could be 10 times higher than in the UK. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that about 15% of the US population suffers from a foodborne illness every year with 3,000 deaths, compared to 1.5% in the UK and 500 deaths.
Of the annual average 3,000 American deaths, 380 are attributed to salmonella poisoning, but in England and Wales, no deaths were recorded from salmonella between 2005 and 2015.
Campylobacter, a pathogen found mainly in chicken, has an infection rate of 6,289 per 100k of population in the US, with the frequency while in England and Wales, the rate was 96.22 per 100k population.
An average of 1,591 cases of listeriosis, caught from eating soft cheeses, unpasteurised milk and chilled ready-to-eat foods are reported in the US every year. In England and Wales, the average is just 177.
So as things stand we won't have a deal which has us accepting American food products but if this changes it sounds like the NHS will need every penny of the tens of millions promised by Boris' Bus to cope with the increased incidence of food poisoning which clearly isn't finger lickin' good.

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