In May, 2008, children's playgrounds were closed on Sydney's Northern Beaches after a rare form of salmonella, paratyphi B var java, normally linked to tropical fish, sickened 23 toddlers. The sand was replaced at a cost of $140,000 but subsequent testing showed the same Salmonella had returned.



Over three years later, and once again, part of the popular children’s playground at Winnererremy Bay has been closed after testing revealed the presence of salmonella bacteria in the surface bark.

Pittwater Council general manager Mark Ferguson said the part of the playground that tested positive would remain closed while the bark was replaced.

Dr Michael Staff, of the Public Health Unit, who conducted the testing, said there had been no cases of gastroenteritis linked to the most recent contamination.
 

Two years ago, Christopher Beth, director of the Redwood City Parks, Recreation and Community Services department, received an anonymous tip about a couple of children getting sick after playing in the sandbox at Stafford Park. He decided to order tests.

“We’d never tested the sand before,” Beth said. “Other cities say they don’t test either. There’s no requirement.”

The results showed high levels of E. coli bacteria. Since then, a similar problem was discovered at Maddux Park. The sand play areas at both parks are being replaced with water features, officials said, and the renovations should be done by mid-January.

The sand features at all the other Redwood City parks were tested, and just Maddux came up with an E. coli problem. The source of contamination was feline feces in one case and human feces in the other.

Today’s USA Today offered up its point-counter-point editorial space this morning to the persistent problem of dangerous E. coli in ground beef.

From the newspaper:

Too many Americans get sick and too many die from eating that most all-American of foods, the hamburger. …

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which has seemed confused as to whether its job is to protect consumers or producers, urges testing by hamburger makers and could require it. But it has not done so, apparently because of industry resistance. It should.

A second problem is that it's physically impossible and economically unrealistic to test every bit of meat. … Though numerous studies have shown that irradiation is safe and effective, public suspicion has helped prevent its spread. USDA, which has approved irradiation, needs to counter the myths and campaign for its wider use.

Because producers and the USDA admit that they can't guarantee germ-free meat, they urge consumers to handle ground beef carefully and cook it to 160 degrees, which kills most bacteria. That should be a last line of defense, not a primary one. You shouldn't be taking your life in your hands if the bun holds an undercooked burger.

From the government, U.S. secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack:

The following are just a few key steps USDA has taken recently:

— Launched an initiative to cut down E. coli contamination, including stepped up meat facility inspections to involve greater use of sampling to monitor the productsgoing into ground beef.

— Appointed a chief medical officer within USDA's Food Safety Inspection Service to coordinate human health issues within USDA and build bridges with the public health community and senior leaders throughout the federal, state and local sectors to establish a consistent approach and heighten food safety awareness.

— Issued consolidated, more effective field instructions on how to inspect for E. coli O157:H7 contamination.

— Started testing additional components of ground beef, including bench trim, and issued new instructions to our employees asking that they verify that plants follow sanitary practices in processing beef carcasses.

Protecting public health is the sole mission of USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service, and we will not rest until we have eliminated food-borne illnesses, hospitalizations and deaths.

If only foodborne illness was as cute as a Kevin Bacon and Elizabeth Perkins movie.
 

About 18 months after the 1993 Jack-in-the-Box E. coli O157:H7 outbreak, I, the erstwhile graduate student, gave a talk to a bunch of food safety types from government and industry. I showed a clip from ABC’s 20/20 television program about a family fighting for regulatory change, and many in the audience laughed at the family when their kitchen was shown. Audience members commented that the consumers were sloppy in their cooking and of course they got sick, and if only they would cook hamburger properly E. coli O157:H7 wouldn’t happen.

I thought the response of the audience was sort of appalling.

In mid-1994, Michael Taylor was appointed chief of USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service.  On Sept. 29, 1994, USDA said it would now regard E. coli O157:H7 in raw ground beef as an “adulterant,” a substance that should not be present in the product. By mid-October, 1994, Taylor announced plans to launch a nationwide sampling of ground beef to assess how much E. coli O157:H7 was in the marketplace. The 5,000 samples would be taken during the year from supermarkets and meat processing plants “to set an example and stimulate companies to put in preventive measures.” Positive samples would prompt product recalls of the entire affected lot, effectively removing it from any possibility of sale.

That's the long-winded version for what a USDA official said in a 1994 television interview: we'll stop blaming consumers  when they get sick from the food and water they consume.

But the just-cook-it crowd persisted. And still does today.

A couple of weeks ago, while announcing a ground beef recall in Colorado, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety Inspection Service stated in a release,

FSIS would like to remind consumers of the importance of following food safety guidelines when handling and preparing raw meat. Ground beef should be cooked to a safe minimum internal temperature of 160° Fahrenheit.

I would like to remind FSIS that it ain’t so easy to handle contaminated ground beef and not spread it around a home or food service kitchen.

Jim Marsden, a former vp at the American Meat Institute and now a professor at Kansas State University, wrote in his meatingplace.com blog last week, the top-10 reasons “just cook it” does not, and will not, work.

1. E. coli O157:H7 is a unique pathogen. The levels of this organism necessary to cause infection are very low.

2. The severity of the disease E. coli O157:H7 can cause, especially in children is devastating.

3. In many cases, parents order hamburgers for their children and rely on restaurants to cook them properly.  In restaurants, parents really have no control over whether the hamburgers they order are sufficiently cooked to eliminate possible contamination from E. coli O157:H7.

4. If consumers unknowingly bring this pathogen into their kitchens, it is almost impossible to avoid cross contamination. Even the smallest amount of contamination on a food that is not cooked can cause illness. Many of the reported cases of E. coli O157:H7 have involved ground beef that was clearly cooked at times and temperatures sufficient to inactivate E. coli O157:H7.  Some other vector, i.e. cross contamination was probably involved.

5. Even if consumers attempt to use thermometers to measure cooking temperature, it is difficult to properly measure the internal temperature of hamburger patties. They would have to use an accurate thermometer and place the probe exactly into the center of the patty. In addition, the inactivation of E. coli O157:H7 is dependent on cooking time and temperature. For example, if they cook to 155 degrees F, they should hold that temperature for 16 seconds. It is not realistic to expect that consumers, many of which are children will scientifically measure the internal temperature of hamburgers.

6. The way ground beef is packaged, it is virtually impossible to remove it from packages or chubs and make patties without spreading contamination if it is present.

7. Sometimes ground beef appears to be cooked when it really isn’t. There is a phenomenon called “premature browning” that can make ground beef appear to be fully cooked when in fact it is undercooked.

8. E. coli O157:H7 may be present in beef products other than ground beef. For example, in non-intact beef products, including tenderized steaks that are not always cooked to temperatures required for inactivation.

9. There have been many cases and outbreaks of E. coli O157:H7 associated with foods that are not cooked (i.e. fresh cut produce).

10. As Senator Patrick Leahy said after the 1993 Jack-in-the-Box outbreak – “The death penalty is too strong a punishment for undercooking a hamburger”.  He was right –consumers will make mistakes. There needs to be a margin of safety so that undercooking does not result in disease or death.