A short-lived US case was focus of one of 2011's fifth most important food safety stories

A US food-safety case involving canteloupes from Guatemala this year was notable for several reasons.

Del Monte Fresh Produce tried to get a federal judge to question the science of epidemiology and set a standard in which only the "smoking gun" of a positive genetic test proving contamination could be used in closing the US border to foreign food.

Del Monte filed the case in federal district court in Maryland after the US Food and Drug Administration issued an "import alert" on cantaloupes grown in any of the approximately 15 fields at the Asuncion Mita farm in Guatemala.

Original source: Food Safety News