Canadians can go back to sleep; Maple Leaf Foods is profitable again
Some American colleagues have said killing 22 customers with deli-meat would have led to a non-existent company. Not so in Canada, where $5.5 billion companies like Maple Leaf Foods can say with a straight face that listeria presented new challenges in the ready-to-eat food category.
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Maple Leaf has been praised for its communication activities in the aftermath of the listeria outbreak last fall, but instead of taking a real leadership role they have fallen back on the tired and true – their stock went up, so everyone is happy.
Specifically, Maple Leaf has failed to provide point-of-sale warnings to at-risk populations like pregnant women and old folks, failed to publicly release listeria test data and failed to promote their food safety efforts at retail, to enhance the food safety culture back at the producer and processor level, and to build consumer confidence. A completely blown opportunity.
Well done: be aggressively mediocre. That’s how to get brownie points in Canada.
Marketing food safety: Maple Lodge Farms deli-meat edition
Maple Lodge Farms is often confused with Maple Leaf Foods, the latter of the listeria mess in Canada a year ago that killed 22 people.
In an effort to protect their brand, Maple Lodge has taken to marketing food safety. And I’m all for it.
These full-page advertisements are from a couple of Canadian magazines, the Sept. 2009 issue of Today’s Parent (right), and the Oct. 2009 issue of Canadian Living (below, left).
There’s far too many sick people, and far too much bureau-dancing around foodborne illness: The best food producers, processors, retailers and restaurants should go above and beyond minimal government and auditor standards and sell food safety solutions directly to the public. The best organizations will use their own people to demand ingredients from the best suppliers; use a mixture of encouragement and enforcement to foster a food safety culture; and use technology to be transparent -- whether it's live webcams in the facility or real-time test results on the website -- to help restore the shattered trust with the buying public.
Those companies that promote food safety culture can market their activities, and then consumers have a way to choose at the check-out aisle, providing feedback to those companies that make food safety a public priority.
Maple Lodge isn’t so much promoting a food safety culture as a technological fix. But at least they’re out there. A case could be made that the tomatoes, lettuce and sprouts pictured in these sandwiches also pose a significant food safety risk. That’s why buyers have to source food from safe sources.
Maple Leaf says listeria happens; Carl says, stop whining
Michael McCain, president of Maple Leaf Foods, told a press conference yesterday that continuing to find listeria in the plant responsible for producing luncheon meats that have killed 26 and sickened 63 in Canada was no biggie.
“To suggest a shock at a positive environmental test is at best misguided and at worst fear mongering.”
As Toronto’s Globe and Mail reported this morning,
When the company's deli meats were first linked to an outbreak of the food-borne disease known as listeriosis last August, it was a humble Mr. McCain who stood before television cameras and reporters and apologized.
Yesterday, by contrast, he defiantly reproached those who have criticized Canada's food-safety watchdog, including the media, accusing them of undermining the public's confidence in the system and of potentially jeopardizing thousands of jobs.
“There's been a lot of criticism of the [Canadian Food Inspection Agency] in recent weeks,” he said. “While there's likely lots of blame to go around, I personally see no balance in the reporting.” …
He said it is unrealistic for the public to have zero tolerance for the bacteria because it is everywhere in the environment.
“Frankly, if that was the tolerance level of Canadians, then Canadians would starve. They wouldn't eat.”
Mr. McCain, this isn’t gotcha journalism and you’re not Sarah Palin. Yes, you have finally released some test results -- four out of 3,850 product samples and one environmental sample out of 671 tested positive for listeria in product that was never released to the public – but you refuse to release results prior to public notification of the outbreak.
Yes, this is the most scrutinized plant in North America. Apparently more inspectors, even with listeria goggles, won’t make the listeria go away. The political opportunism being practiced by the inspector’s union and various parties falling over themselves to promise the hiring of more inspectors in the lead-up to Canada’s federal election on Tuesday is breathtakingly offensive to the sick and dead – I think I just threw up a bit in my mouth.
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And yes, the risk is small -- Mansel Griffiths, an adviser to Maple Leaf, said the tiny fraction of products that tested positive, 0.1 per cent, was in the range that would be found in deli meats for sale in Canada, ranging from 0.1 to .03 per cent – but I’m sure glad you’re not advising pregnant women, like my wife, who are 20 times more susceptible to infection with listeria – a bug that has a 20-30 per cent kill rate.
Now that Mr. McCain is a listeria expert, telling Canadians to get over it, listeria happens, I wonder why he never issued such a warning about the risk of listeria in his products before 26 were killed. Would he serve cold cuts to the elderly in nursing homes where many of the 20 confirmed deaths occurred? What would he recommend to one of his pregnant family members? That listeria happens?
In response to the initial coverage of Mr. McCain’s statements yesterday, Carl, a former USDA guru e-mailed me, stating,
“Ummm, maybe someone ought to point McCain to Nebraska's series of webinars. It'll take more than the webinars but it could be a start. Eliminating listeriae in plants has been done but it takes effort and diligence not just whining.”
Here’s the info for the latest listeria webinar from Nebraska.
Free Web Seminars on Controlling Listeria monocytogenes on Ready-to-Eat Meat and Poultry Products and in the RTE Processing Environment
The Listeria monocytogenes is a foodborne pathogen and is most often transmitted through ready-to-eat (RTE) foods products contaminated with this pathogen. People at most risk for illness and infection due to this pathogen are young, elderly and those will weakened immune systems such as the immuno-compromised.
The USDA-FSIS requires the Ready-to-Eat (RTE) meat and poultry processors to control Listeria monocytogenes in the environment and on their products. The web-seminar is designed to help small and very small RTE meat and poultry businesses to address Listeria in their RTE environment and ways to reduce the Listeria risk in their products. The web-seminar is designed to update you and provide you an opportunity to ask questions and get answers from the experts.
The University of Nebraska along with its collaborating partners, Colorado State University, Cornell University, Kansas State University and The Ohio State University is conducting a series of free web seminars to inform and educate the RTE meat and poultry processors on various aspects of controlling the organism in the RTE processing environment and on the product. This web seminar series is funded through a grant from the National Integrated Food Safety Initiative (Special Emphasis Grant No. 2005-511110-03278) of the CSREES, U.S. Department of Agriculture.
The next session is scheduled for Oct 15, 2008 from 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM (CST). Those interested can participate in these free web seminars by logging in at the following website:
http://connect.extension.iastate.edu/nebraska/
To receive notifications and presentation materials ahead of the web seminar, please register by sending an e-mail to Nina Murray at nmurray2@unl.edu with your name and e-mail.
Topic: L. monocytogenes Control Strategies: Quality Effects on RTE Meat Products Speaker: Dr. Dennis Burson, University of Nebraska
Dr. Dennis Burson is a Professor of meat science in the Department of Animal Science at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. He also serves as the Extension meat specialist for the state of Nebraska and assists the meat, poultry and egg industry with outreach activities. He received his B.S. degree from University of Nebraska and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Kansas State University. His outreach focus is on improving quality, consistency and value of market animals, value addition and processing of meat products and food safety for meat and poultry processors. Dr. Burson has conducted numerous meat processing, harvesting and quality workshops in addition to food safety workshops including HACCP for the meat and poultry industry over the years and still is very active in the food safety outreach programs. He coordinates the four state consortium of Universities (UNL, KSU, SDSU, and Missouri) and holds several HACCP workshops within each of the states every year. He has taught several courses, including animal and carcass evaluation, principles of meat evaluation, grading and judging and advanced meat grading and evaluation. Dr. Burson is active in several professional organizations, including American Meat Science Association, Institute of Food Technologists and International Association for Food Protection among others.
Topic: Tracking Listeria in the RTE Meat and Poultry Processing Environment: DNA Based Methods Speaker: Dr. Kendra Nightingale, Colorado State University
Kendra Nightingale is originally from a small farming community in western Kansas. Kendra received a B.S. degree in Agriculture from Kansas State University, where she participated in the undergraduate honors program. Kendra also holds a M.S. degree from Kansas State University in Food Science, where her research evaluated the use of lactoferrin, a milk-derived protein, to decontaminate and extend the shelf-life of beef products. Kendra Nightingale completed her Ph.D. at Cornell University in Food Science with a concentration in Food Microbiology and minors in Epidemiology and Microbiology. Her Ph.D. work probed the molecular epidemiology, ecology, and evolution of the human foodborne and animal pathogen Listeria monocytogenes. Kendra also completed her postdoctoral training in the Department of Food Science at Cornell University. Kendra joined the Department of Animal Sciences at Colorado State University as an Assistant Professor in 2006.
More of the same from Maple Leaf, CFIA
Maple Leaf Foods president and CEO Michael McCain said last night that “consistent with normal findings and practices” listeria continues to be found at the same facility that produced cold-cuts linked to at least 20 deaths and 50 illnesses in Canada.
“Listeriosis is an exceptionally rare illness,” he said, “but we are taking every precaution possible.”
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I’m sure the illness didn’t feel exceptionally rare to the sick and the dead.
Mr. McCain also reiterated that,
“Listeria exists in all food plants, all supermarkets and presumably in all kitchens,”
which is exactly why my pregnant wife and Ben’s pregnant wife didn’t go near Maple Leaf or any other cold cuts during their pregnancies. So I’m sure Mr. McCain will put as much energy and resources into advising vulnerable populations to stay away from Maple Leaf cold-cuts and other refrigerated ready-to-eat foods as he is into re-opening the Toronto plant.
And if Maple Leaf is now “behaving in the most conservative way possible,” what were they doing before the listeria outbreak became public knowledge on Aug. 20, 2008?
Confidential data obtained by the Toronto Star and CBC and reported last night revealed that two-thirds of Maple Leaf meat samples collected from Toronto hospitals and nursing homes tested positive for a virulent strain of listeria just before the country’s largest food recall.
The test results show a dramatically high percentage of bacteria-laced ham, corned beef, turkey, and roast beef was being served to hundreds of vulnerable hospital patients and seniors. Experts say it’s more contamination than they have seen and further evidence of a health risk that should have reached the public’s attention sooner.
“There shouldn’t be any positives,” says Rick Holley, a food safety expert at the University of Manitoba. “The reality is if you did a survey in the market, you might find one or two at most out of this sample that are positive ... And it is a particularly virulent strain of listeria. It’s one of the bad ones.” …
“I’d never seen anything like this,” said Dr. Vinita Dubey, Toronto’s associate medical officer of health. “The fact that so many came back positive shows how contaminated the source was.”
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So given the high level of contamination, what did the Canadian Food Inspection Agency do? Insist on more testing, because epidemiology is not enough to protect the health of Canadians.
In a conference call with members of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency on Aug. 14, Toronto officials told the agency they had enough evidence to make a connection and pressed the CFIA to warn the public about Maple Leaf products.
CFIA officials, however, said they needed to wait for one more set of test results from unopened meat packages.
While the CFIA had identified listeria bacteria at the Maple Leaf Foods meat processing plant in Toronto and even begun an investigation of the company by that time, the federal agency said it wanted definitive test results to see whether it was the same strain as the one responsible for the outbreak.
The CFIA declined a request for an interview with CBC News. The agency maintained that it requires hard scientific proof before it can recall food or issue warnings to the public.
Toronto Public Health said it had gathered plenty of evidence during July and August that linked Maple Leaf meat products to the outbreak, including:
* two deaths linked to listeriosis
* more cases being reported
* meat samples from sandwiches tested positive
* samples from opened meat packages were taken
During a 2005 outbreak of salmonella found in bean sprouts in Kingston, Ont., regional health officials didn't wait for definitive proof to issue their own recall.
"I think it's a less desirable approach, from the point of view of the people we serve, to say, 'We'll have to wait and have confirmation before we can intervene,'" said Dr. Ian Gemmill, the medical officer of health for the Kingston Area Health Unit.
The locals sound increasingly frustrated with CFIA. Until there is a clear policy on when to go public, expect more failures and frustration in the future.
Asked for the listeria test results leading up to the outbreak, the Maple Leaf spokesthingy said last week that, in the spirit of open and transparent co-operation and a genuine desire to improve the safety of refrigerated, ready-to-eat foods, the company would not release them publicly.
Death by cold-cuts? Canadian Ag Minister not as funny as he thinks he is
Michael McCain, the president and CEO of Maple Leaf Foods made a strategic decision once his company decided to handle the growing listeria mess in Canada by saying this wasn’t about government, it was about his company: he effectively cut himself loose from bizarre to self-congratulatory to purely political messages from government and bureaucrats.
That decision looks real smart tonight.
CTV.ca is reporting that during a conference call with scientists, bureaucrats and political staff on Aug. 30, Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz said, after fretting about the political dangers of the Listeria scare, he quipped:
"This is like a death by a thousand cuts. Or should I say cold cuts."
Then when told of a death in Prince Edward Island, Ritz said, "Please tell me it's (Liberal MP) Wayne Easter."
Easter is the Liberal agriculture critic and has called for Ritz's resignation over his handling of the outbreak, which was linked to a Maple Leaf Foods meat processing plant north of Toronto.
Kory Teneycke, a spokesperson for the Prime Minister's Office, said Ritz expressed regret over his remarks to Stephen Harper but there was no suggestion of resigning.
Ritz said,
"My comments were tasteless and completely inappropriate. I apologize unreservedly."
Canoe news reports that Ritz was "less contrite when he was asked about his comments after his flight from Saskatoon touched down at the Ottawa airport Wednesday afternoon". 
A bearded man with Ritz jostled with journalists as the agriculture minister beelined through the terminal to a waiting sedan. At one point the man grabbed a reporter's recorder and jabbed at the off button.
For two minutes Ritz stared dead ahead as he was peppered with questions about the conference call. His only words were clipped.
"Not right now, guys," he said.
Then: "Get out of my face, please."
