Created: 2/18/2009 5:47:13 AM 
ATLANTA (AP) -- The Georgia Senate is set to take up the first piece of legislation resulting from a salmonella outbreak linked to a South Georgia peanut plant. The bill would require food makers to alert state inspectors within 24 hours if a plant's internal tests show its products are contaminated. The bill's sponsor, Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman John Bulloch, said that if the bill had been in place six months ago it would have raised a red flag at the Peanut Corp. plant in Blakely, Ga. Investigators say the Lynchburg, Va.-based company knowingly shipped salmonella-laced products even after internal tests showed they were contaminated. Georgia law does not require the company to share those test results
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