The needs of many large, developed countries like the United States, Canada, nations from Europe, and Australia are now met by camera sliders suppliers from various parts of the world. These need run the gamut from clothing, children’s toys, electronics, and most importantly food items. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCP) estimates that 325,000 citizens are taken to the hospital each year from food poisoning, with 5,000 consequential deaths. Undoubtedly, food safety is a central gas tankless water heater issue in the country. According to United States Census data, food imports have increased to twice the amount in this country from 1997 to 2008. Over 60 percent of imported food comes from developing nations, such as Mexico and China. More than 3 billion pounds of meat was imported by the United States in 2008 alone, with seafood being the principal item. This is critical because improperly produced, prepared, and consumed home microdermabrasion meat is the main cause of food borne illnesses. The United States gets 80 percent of its fish from foreign imports. Of the enormous quantity of imported food coming to America, the FDA only has the capacity to examine less than 2 percent. This is a major predicament because many nations have lower food safety regulations than the United States. “If they are only checking 1 percent of the [food] and finding lots of metal detectors problems, then… there are a lot of problems that are never caught,” says Jean Halloran of Consumer Reports. According to Consumer Reports, the FDA and customs officials only have about one minute on average to inspect each food truck that crosses the U.S.-Mexico border. Out of the 3 billion pounds of meat arriving into the country, 85 million pounds of it is catfish from the dirty Mekong River of Vietnam. Every frozen yogurt machine year, 220,000 tons of industrial waste is dumped into the Mekong River, where fisher-folk catch these fish, right next to beer and cement factories. Regardless of notice from the Vietnamese Government Health department, the toxic catfish is then shipped here. Regrettably, free trade agreements have tied the government’s hands. For example, when Congress passed a ban on chicken food products from China owing to health worries, China sought out the WTO, who decided in favor of China. This will put in an estimated 300 million pounds of potentially hazardous meat coming in. In the last 15 years, over 300,000 family-owned farms have gone out of business and seafood producers across the country have made great efforts to compete with cheap, unsafe foreign products. At the end of the day however, it is likely that not just livelihoods at stake, but our very lives themselves. How do we contend with this problem? First and foremost, we need to appropriately label country of origin on products. American consumers need to know where their food is coming so they can choose to avoid consuming possibly toxic imports. After that, we need to create safety inspection fees for overseas food and put that capital into the FDA to make sure proper inspections are made. Last, we need to scrutinize trade agreements that decrease our capability to protect ourselves from unsafe food. Right now, we are represented by international entities that do not necessarily have our best interests in mind. We should strongly consider implementing more inspections at the state level. In Alabama (one of the few states to do so), more than half of imported fish is turned away due to safety concerns. Other states would surely gain by enacting legislation comparable to Alabama’s meticulous standards. With these safeguards in place, we will be able to trim down the risks brought by toxic food imports, and lessen the number of American deaths due to by toxic food.