Maine

  • 16 sick from Salmonella Typhimurium in ground beef from Hannaford Supermarkets; CDC weighs in

    Posted: December 20th, 2011 - 8:01pm by Doug Powell

    CDC is collaborating with public health officials in several states and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service (USDA-FSIS) to investigate a multistate outbreak of Salmonella Typhimurium infections linked to eating ground beef purchased from Hannaford Supermarkets.

    Representatives from Hannaford have been cooperating with public health officials throughout the investigation. Public health investigators are using DNA "fingerprints" of Salmonella bacteria obtained through diagnostic testing with pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) to identify cases of illness that may be part of this outbreak. Investigators are using data from PulseNet, the national subtyping network made up of state and local public health laboratories and federal food regulatory laboratories that performs molecular surveillance of foodborne infections.

    Preliminary testing shows that the outbreak strain of Salmonella Typhimurium is resistant to several commonly prescribed antibiotics. This antibiotic resistance may be associated with an increase in the risk of hospitalization or possible treatment failure in infected individuals.

    A total of 16 persons infected with the outbreak strain of Salmonella Typhimurium have been reported from 7 states. The number of ill persons identified in each state is as follows: HI (1), KY (1), MA (1), ME (4), NH (4), NY (4), and VT (1). Among persons for whom information is available, illnesses began on or after October 8, 2011. Ill persons range in age from 1 year to 79 years old, with a median age of 45 years old. Fifty percent are male. Among the 13 ill persons with available information, 7 (54%) have been hospitalized. No deaths have been reported.

    Among 16 ill persons for whom information is available, 11 (69%) reported consuming ground beef in the week before their illness began. Among the 11 cases who reported consuming ground beef, 10 (91%) reported purchasing ground beef from Hannaford stores. For ill persons for whom information is available, reported purchase dates range from October 12, 2011 to November 20, 2011.

    On December 15, 2011, Hannaford, a Scarborough, Maine-based grocery chain, recalled an undetermined amount of fresh ground beef products that bear sell-by dates of December 17, 2011 or earlier.

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    Beef, food safety, Hannaford, maine, salmonella, Typhimurium
  • Salmonella warning: careful helping that turtle across the road

    Posted: October 2nd, 2011 - 6:15am by Doug Powell

     Turtles, even those in the wilds of Maine, are wonderful sources of salmonella.

    Ken Allen, an editor, writer and photographer, writes in Maine’s Morning Sentinel that on Aug. 27, the day before Hurricane Irene hit Maine, Katelyn, my youngest daughter, and I were bicycling north on Route 27 and came to the "turtle crossing" just south of the old Messalonskee Lake boat launch by Belgrade Stream, apparently an ancient migration route for this reptile.

    That day, a painted turtle -- large as this species goes -- had hunkered in grass by the breakdown lane, pointing west toward the busy highway.

    That day with Katelyn, I stopped my bicycle, showed her the turtle and said, "Why don't you move it across the road so no one runs over it."

    I wanted Katelyn to get accustomed to doing good deeds for wildlife, but she was worried the turtle might scratch her, a good thing.

    Unknown to me at that moment, aquatic turtles commonly carry salmonella bacteria. I should have known that fact after writing nature articles for the past three decades -- but just didn't.

    Normally, this small species doesn't claw people anywhere near as readily as snappers do, making me careless. When I gently grasped the carapace with my fingers and thumb between the front and back legs, the turtle immediately reached back with its right front leg and scratched my index finger hard enough to break the skin. Then later, without washing my hands, I ate a piece of pizza at a convenience store. Either incident could have given me Salmonella poisoning.

    By Monday morning, I was deathly sick with diarrhea, big-time nausea, headache, fever, chill and worst of all, severe abdominal pain, and it lasted through the power outage until well into Wednesday.

    The following day, I told William Woodward, a retired biologist, about the snapper, and he quickly said, "Be careful handling turtles because they commonly carry Salmonella."

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    maine, salmonella, turtle
  • Salmonella kills 1 at Maine assisted living center

    Posted: February 10th, 2011 - 3:01pm by Doug Powell

    One person died and another was hospitalized in the last two weeks after a salmonella outbreak swept through Quarry Hill, a retirement and assisted living facility in Camden, Maine.

    The Bangor Daily News cited Dr. Stephen Sears, acting director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, as saying that seven positive cases of salmonella among the residents have been identified so far.

    Quarry Hill offers independent living, assisted living, short- and long-term nursing care and rehabilitation and specialized memory-loss care to just over 150 people. Staff at the facility first became aware of the outbreak on Jan. 24, when several residents became ill with symptoms that included diarrhea, cramps, headache, fever and vomiting.

    The Maine CDC sent two epidemiologists to the health care facility to try to find other sick residents and to identify a possible source. The experts also worked with facility staff to increase their education about salmonellosis, the infection caused by the salmonella bacteria.

    Sears said efforts to track the cause of the outbreak have so far been fruitless. The strain of salmonella in the Camden outbreak has been identified as javiana.

    He said that the Maine CDC has not seen other salmonella outbreaks from that strain in the state recently and that the problem appears to be “slowing down” at Quarry Hill, with no new cases reported in days.

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    asisted-living, Death, food safety, maine, salmonella