Between May and September 2011, Europe experienced a major health crisis, trying to determine which foods were responsible for an outbreak of 3979 affected people and 55 deaths caused by a specific strain of a bacterium, Escherichia coli O104:H4. This presentation will describe the regulation efforts displayed during that crisis, drawing on 781 French newspaper articles and on press releases and reports issued by public authorities (EU Commission, European Food Safety Authority, member-state governments) and private actors (food producers, retailers).
It will underline three key questions, showing the economic, technical, legal and political effects of an unknown emerging risk in a unified transnational food market. How shall food alerts be regulated? Who shall be responsible for market withdrawals? Is there a need to compensate for market losses caused by false alarms? Despite pre-existing European Regulations, this crisis revealed organizational failure and a complex regulatory ecology
