Although recalls of beef have fallen off a bit in 2009 (only 571,922 pounds) from 2008 (7,083,399 pounds) and 2007 (33,756,142 pounds) (PDF), 2006 was the best year we had seen awhile – 181,900 pounds. 

Of course this does not account for the over 143,000,000 pounds of beef product recalled due to the Hallmark fiasco.  Illnesses?  Well, we have not yet seen a downturn as we had hoped.  Let’s hope the rest of 2009 has no more recalls and no more illnesses.