Ground beef recall linked to cluster of E. coli O157 illnesses in New England
USDA FSIS has announced a recall of 545,699 pounds of fresh ground beef products that may be contaminated with E. coli O157:H7 and distributed in seven states. According to FSIS, the product has been linked to a cluster of illnesses in New England.
There are quite a few recalls going on most of the time; this one is notable because this product has been linked to an outbreak of illnesses at a camp in Massachusetts. It's also notable because bulk amounts of the product were shipped down the East Coast for further processing. Retail outlets receiving some of this product include Shaw, Giant, Price Chopper,Trader Joe's, BJs and others.
From the press release:
"Products for further processing:
Cases of 10-pound "FAIRBANK FARMS FRESH GROUND BEEF CHUBS."
Each case bears the establishment number "EST. 492" inside the USDA mark of inspection; has package dates of "09.14.09," "09.15.09," or "09.16.09;" and sell-by dates of "10.3.09," "10.4.09," or "10.5.09. These products were distributed to retail establishments in Maryland, Massachusetts, North Carolina, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia for further processing. However, these products at retail will likely not bear the package dates and sell-by dates listed above. Customers with concerns should contact their point of purchase."(2).jpg)
It is unlikely that any of the product is still being sold fresh at retail stores (the best-if-sold-before dates range from mid-September to early October) but it's likely that the affected beef is still around in freezers. The meat juices from thawing can provide a nice vehicle for pathogen transfer.
Stick it in with a tip-sensitive digital thermometer (in multiple spots) to ensure that ground beef has reached a safe temperature and be vigilant in containing meat juices when thawing frozen meats. Juicy is good, nasty meat juice spread around the kitchen isn't.
Sit and drink Salmonella tea?
Another in a long line of Salmonella in low water activity foods (here, here and here), Fireside Coffee is recalling packages of their chai tea due to possible Salmonella contamination. The recall includes certain flavors of the tea: spiced, chocolate, vanilla and decaf vanilla.
According to AP:
No illness has been reported. The recalled chai tea was sold nationwide at retail stores, through mail order and at art fairs. The recall includes select lot numbers of four flavors of the tea: spiced, chocolate, vanilla and decaf vanilla. Details: by phone at 800-344-5282.
Growing up in the age of grunge, Salmonella tea reminded me of the flannel-wearing guitar heroes of my youth, check out Nirvana's Pennyroyal Tea below. This MTV unplugged special actually did blow my mind when I was 14.
Cilantro recalled after Salmonella test; no one sick
Fresh herbs are particularly prone to bacterial contamination: parsley, basil, and especially cilantro.
Sweet Superior Fruit Co, based in McAllen, Texas, announced Saturday it is recalling 104 crates of fresh cilantro over concerns of possible salmonella contamination discovered through testing by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
The company says no illnesses have been reported.
The company said the potentially contaminated cilantro was sold July 13-16 at its McAllen facility. Sweet Superior Fruit said it may have been sold again by retail outlets in the McAllen area or used to manufacture additional products.
Sweet Superior Fruit is urging companies to try to recall the product and telling consumers to return it or throw it away.
Fresh Anaheim peppers pulled from Wegmans on Salmonella suspicion
Wegmans has removed fresh Anaheim peppers from its Produce departments due to the possibility of salmonella contamination. The FDA is currently investigating the situation.
If you still have Anaheim peppers, please throw them away. Do not return them to the store. You may go to the service desk for information on receiving a refund.
For more information, please call Wegmans Consumer Affairs at 1-800-934-6267, x-4760, Monday through Friday, 8am-5pm.
Sprout farm to begin testing for listeria
Close to 15,000 pounds of Chang Farm bean and soy sprouts were recalled from retailers and restaurants in four northeastern states last week after Listeria monocytogenes was found in a bag of sprouts at a retail store.
Speaking for the company, Sidney Chang said,
"We followed FDA guidelines to test for salmonella and E. coli 0517:H7. We don’t test for listeria, because they don’t require that."
So?
It is consumers who ultimately decide which food companies stay in business and make a profit, and consumers demand food that is free of all pathogens.
Is Chang Farm willing to step it up?
As stated in an article by The Packer,
“We want to make sure our facility is safe," Chang said. "We’re going to add more measures. We thought we were doing the right things.”
Valley Meats ground beef recalled due to E. coli
Almost 100,000 pounds of ground beef are being recalled today after an epidemiological investigation linked E. coli O157:H7 infections in three states to the products.
The meat—sold frozen as ground beef, chopped steak, and pre-formed patties—was produced by Valley Meats LLC of Coal Valley, Illinois, on March 10, 2009 and distributed to various consignees nationwide.
A USDA FSIS press release states,
“The problem was discovered through an epidemiological investigation of illnesses. On May 13, 2009, FSIS was informed by the Ohio Department of Health of a cluster of E. coli O157:H7 infections. Illnesses have been reported in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Illinois.”
The pathogen, found in the poop of warm-blooded animals, can be killed with sufficient heat.
However, as the president and chief executive of the American Frozen Food Institute, Kraig R. Naasz, stated today in a letter to the editor of the New York Times,
“While food safety is a shared responsibility among food producers, government agencies and consumers, we recognize that the primary responsibility rests with food producers. Providing consumers with safe and nutritious products is a responsibility frozen food producers stake their names and reputations on.”
The letter was written in response to the Times’ May 15 article on frozen entrees, which Naasz felt did not “fully depict the frozen food industry’s commitment to product safety.”
With the name and reputation of Valley Meats on the line, will they be able to demonstrate a similar commitment to the safety of food? As the data on those sickened by Valley Meats' products are released, it's likely we'll find out.
Food Safety Working Group hears 'good is simply not good enough'
A White House Food Safety Working Group Listening Session was held Wednesday that marked "the beginning of a significant and critical process that will fully review the safety of our nation's food supply," according to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack.
In his opening remarks, Vislack outlined several specific challenges that would require imput from the stakeholders present at the session. These included the development of an approach consistent between the FDA and USDA for preventing foodborne illnesses, as well as an active surveillance and response system for foodborne disease outbreaks.
In regards to the latter, Vislack stated, "Our regulatory agencies must actively watch for disease outbreaks and take rapid action to ensure that we have effective and targeted recalls. Such recalls are in the interests of public health and the strength of industry sectors that might otherwise be tarnished by massive recalls."
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who oversees the FDA and the CDC, also briefly mentioned the subject of foodborne outbreaks in her opening remarks, saying, "When outbreaks do occur, we must all respond quickly, both to protect public health and to speed the recovery of affected industries."
Sebelius went on to say, “We have already made good use of new tools to protect and inform the public. When peanut products were recalled, we produced a widget that was placed on more than 20,000 external Web sites and resulted in 9.6 million page views. And as we saw during the H1N1 flu outbreak, communication is critical during any kind of crisis and we will use every tool possible to get the word out."
However, she failed to mention how effective that tool was in protecting public health and speeding the recovery of the peanut industry.
As Vislack stated at the end of his opening remarks, "[W]e need to develop a way to measure our success... Lives are at stake and good is simply not good enough."
Kraft unit recalls Salmonella-tainted trail mix; it's the pistachios
Back to Nature Foods Co., a Wisconsin firm owned by Kraft Foods Inc., issued a nationwide recall Wednesday on its Nantucket Blend trail mix because some of the pistachio nuts tested positive for Salmonella.
And the pistachios came from a supplier to the Georgia Nut Company, which found the Salmonella through its own testing.
The press release from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said,
This possible contamination is not connected with the recent outbreak associated with peanuts or peanut butter and no cases of Salmonellosis have been reported in connection with the recall.
Back to Nature Foods products are sold in Chicago area Dominick’s, Jewel, Target, Wal-mart, Whole Foods, Wild Oats, Hy-Vee, Kroger, Meijer and Woodman’s stores, as well as at military commissaries.
Casey did a quick search and found there have been no Salmonella outbreaks or reported positives associated with pistachios, although 2006 Good Agricultural Practice documents suggest limiting exposure of pistachios to irrigation water and carefully handling on-farm manure because of the possibility of microbial contaminants. It appears there's a widespread belief that the hull protects the edible parts, and drying and roasting further mitigate risks of contamination, although the GAP document and research on other nuts has concluded such assumptions remain unverified.
Sesame, sunflower seeds possibly linked to UK salmonella outbreak
The Independent reports that Tesco, Waitrose and well-known health food shops have withdrawn tens of thousands of packets of edible seeds in one of the biggest product recalls in a decade after a survey found "unacceptable" levels of salmonella and E. coli.
One-in-50 packs of ready-to-eat seeds such as sesame and sunflower was found to be contaminated.
The study's authors pointed out that although there was no direct link to the contaminated seeds, 137 people in England and Wales fell ill from six sub-types of salmonella found in the seeds during the six-month study. Many more ill people are likely to have not reported their symptoms to GPs. The Health Protection Agency and the local authority group Lacors, which conducted the study, warned food manufacturers and retailers to improve hygiene during harvesting and drying of seeds.
The study was carried out because seeds – a popular snack among health-conscious shoppers wishing to avoid high-calorie chocolate and sweets – have become associated with at least seven outbreaks of salmonella in countries such as Germany, Norway, Sweden and Australia since 2000.
To gauge levels of contamination here, environmental health officers from 317 local authorities collected 3,735 packets of ready-to-eat seeds from 3,390 supermarkets, health food shops, convenience stores and market stalls between October 2007 and March 2008. They were analysed in 32 food laboratories.
Maple Leaf discovers the thesaurus
Amy and me and baby Sorenne are headed to Boston, leaving Manhattan (Kansas) at 3 a.m. tomorrow. And whatever stresses come along, it’s good to remember the basics.
Amy and me, we like to write, and we make each other better. We also surround ourselves with others who want to do things better.
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Michael McCain (right, exactly as shown) may run a $5.5 billion a year company but Maple Leaf Foods has lousy writers. They’ve got the on-line thesaurus to find synonyms like stringent, thorough and rigorous, but the writers utterly fail to explain what this means.
Yesterday, Maple Leaf Foods Inc. reported a fourth quarter loss that narrowed on higher sales and helped by price increases, fluctuations in the Canadian dollar and contributions from acquisitions. Results, however, were impacted by the recall of meat products, contaminated with a strain of listeria bacteria, linked to the illness and death of several consumers.
Uh, 20 dead and at least 56 sick is not several consumers.
The same day, Maple Leaf announced that it is proceeding with a voluntary recall of approximately 1,100 cases of wieners produced at its plant in Hamilton, Ontario because the products were shipped in violation of the company's rigorous food safety protocols. …
Under Maple Leaf's stringent food safety protocols, the Company tests for listeria species, not Listeria monocytogenes. Six species of Listeria exist, but only one, Listeria monocytogenes, has any potential to impact human health. This is an extremely conservative approach as it treats any positive listeria test result with the highest level of corrective actions. Due to human error, a small quantity of wieners produced at the Hamilton plant that were quarantined under these routine enhanced procedures was inadvertently shipped to distribution centres and customers in Eastern Canada. All customers have been notified and product is immediately being removed from inventory or store shelves and returned to the Company.
Why is the Company capitalized? Will the Canadian economy shrivel if one questions the Company? And did Michael McCain call each customer?
"Unlike other situations, this event occurred as a direct result of human error and did not uphold our stringent industry leading protocols." said Michael McCain, President and CEO of Maple Leaf Foods. "Notwithstanding the exceptionally low risk this represents, Maple Leaf is committed to maintaining the most stringent standards and we intend to live by those standards so consumers can have absolute confidence in the integrity of our products. We are taking immediate action and will not condone anything other than strict adherence to our protocols."
That’s a lot of words to say we screwed up, again. But it gets better.
"As we have seen with the wide range of food products which have been recalled to date in 2009, as enhanced surveillance becomes more pervasive in the food industry, positive listeria findings and related recalls will occur more frequently. This should be regarded positively as it provides assurance that the industry and government are acting swiftly to protect public health", said Mr. McCain.
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Who is we? What are these food products that have been recalled in 2009? The ones that contain peanut paste shit? Or just listeria ones? Who’s enhanced surveillance? Sara Lee’s Bil Mar unit had a listeria outbreak linked to hot dogs that killed 20 in 1998. Why is Maple Leaf bragging about enhanced surveillance 10 years and another 20 deaths too late?
Maple Leaf has implemented the most stringent food safety system in Canada.
Canada? Where they have visiting U.S. Presidents sign a guest book and worship their vengeful beaver gods with offerings of back bacon and doughnuts (go to 1:25 min in the video below).
As I said in the Toronto Star this morning,
"People, especially kids, eat ... processed hot dog wieners all the time (without cooking them) or just give them a quick zap in the microwave."
Michael McCain, since you’re the face of Maple Leaf, do you let your kids eat processed wieners straight out of the refrigerator? Should there be warning labels on packages of hot dogs not to eat them without cooking to a sufficient internal temperature?
Tweeting about Food Safety
Do you remember how you first heard about the latest round of Salmonella in the peanut butter? Was it on the evening news, in the paper, or did you hear about it through Facebook or Twitter? If you’re in the under 30 crowd you might fit into the latter category. Social networking sites, like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace are increasingly being utilized for up-to-the-minute recall information.
During the recent Salmonella outbreak, the United States Department of Health and Human Services - specifically the Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - engaged in a heavy social media push to inform citizens about the health risks and product recalls. As a result, the CDC Social Media Center was created as a central hub for harnessing the power of social networking to spread recall information.
Twitter is one of the sites currently used in the assortment of links. Twitter allows users to “follow” one another’s “tweets” about what they do during the day. The website is on the rise among medical professionals and there are accounts for all ranges of industry available. Why not food safety?
Federal health agencies have been experimenting with new Internet tools, dubbed Web 2.0, that make it easier to deliver information directly to the public. The "Health 2.0" movement got a big boost with the arrival of President Barack Obama, who is pushing federal agencies to use the tools to make the federal government more transparent and participatory.
Current news about FDA recalls can be found @FDArecalls and public health updates from the CDC can be found @CDCemergency. The only snag is you have to sign up in order to receive tweets from the FDA, but hey, its free. After all, you’re no one if you’re not on Twitter.
The recalls grow
AP is reporting that the Texas Department of State Health Services has ordered a recall of everything ever produced at Peanut Corp of America's plant in Plainview TX.
The order came Thursday evening from the Department of State Health Services. The agency says "dead rodents, rodent excrement and bird feathers" were discovered Wednesday in a crawl space above a production area.
A state inspection also found that the unit's air handling system was pulling debris from the infested crawl space into production areas.
The plant began operating in March 2005 but was shut down earlier this week.
The health department order also requires the plant to stop producing and distributing food products.
This will lead to more recalls -- the FDA's searchable database already lists over 2000.
Some choice quotes:
Robert Grauer, president of In a Nut Shell, a San Leandro, Calif., said he's not taking any chances. The company has about 200 cases of peanuts from the Texas plant, and has to decided to hold them in storage.
"We're not going to take a chance risking our customers — not over some peanuts."
Ken Werner, owner of Werner Gourmet Meat Snacks Inc. in Tillamook, Ore., said fewer than 20 of his company's roughly 100 products contain peanuts. He recalled trail mixes and peanuts that were covered under earlier recalls linked to the Georgia plant. But he hadn't yet recalled any products linked to the Texas plant.
"We're waiting to hear from the FDA as far as a recall," he said. "If they issue a recall, we'll recall more products."
The Bergin Fruit & Nut Co. in St. Paul, Minn., has had nearly 2,000 pounds of raw redskin and blanched peanuts on hold since late January, when Peanut Corp. issued an expanded recall that included products produced at its Georgia plant as far back as 2007, said quality control manager Bill Jaspers.
"We will probably be destroying it because, frankly, I think PCA has got bigger problems than a product recall," he said.
Recalls wreak havoc, but safety sells
At the grocery store yesterday I found jars of Kroger peanut butter stacked nearly waist-high on display at the end of an aisle. Curious, I circled the display, thinking I might find a sign saying “Does not contain Salmonella” or something to that effect. There was no such ad.
Why aren’t the makers of safe peanut butter bragging about it?
K-LOVE is always in the background when I do my writing.
While one of the K-LOVE news anchors was updating listeners on the Peanut Corp. salmonella outbreak, the DJ mentioned he put off buying a jar of peanut butter at the grocery store the night before. He felt it wiser to wait.
Peanut Corp., the FDA, and several snack manufacturers
—including General Mills and Kroger—have warned against eating products made with peanut butter and/or peanut paste produced by Peanut Corp.
FDA may not be entirely sure what products those are, but has said many times,
"We don't have concern about the national, name-brand peanut butter that's sold in jars at supermarkets and retail outlets."
Consumers are wary anyway.
Part of the problem could be the misleading images (such as the graphic above by ABC News) put forth by the media.
It could just be that recalls are scary.
After the Maple Leaf listeria outbreak, Canadians cut back on deli meats of all brands and even stopped buying hot dogs. People defensively avoided anything recognized to support the growth of listeria.
People value safe food.
If given a compelling story of how companies and industries identify and control risks, they might make different buying decisions.
Canadian rejection of peanuts led to recall? I don't think so.
The Globe and Mail reports today that a rejected shipment of Peanut Corp of America's (PCA) chopped peanuts last spring led to the recall of almost 200 products in Canada and over 800 in the U.S.
The Globe article says:
A customer in Canada rejected the peanuts, an act that may have saved lives here, and prompted officials with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to turn their attention to sanitary conditions in the Blakely, Ga., peanut plant at the centre of the outbreak.
As Fred Willard so succinctly puts it in A Mighty Wind: "I don't think so".
It's more likely that the 500+ illnesses and the 8 deaths linked to PCA's peanut butter products (not the customer-rejected peanuts -- in April 2008) led to the recall.
And overstating how great the system works (which happens all too often, akin to safest food in the world) when lots of other companies in Canada have used the peanut butter products is not all that reassuring. I know there is a lot of anti-America sentiment around the economic stimulus/protectionism stuff, but a Canadian company rejecting that shipment did not save the day and halt this outbreak (which is still classed as active) or start the recall. Sure the rejected shipment is part of the picture, but no one got really excited before the Salmonella illnesses started showing up.
That's right.
When danger lurks in the grocery aisles, call the Recaller
Deciphering recall information is tough for the regular consumer. 
Automated phone calls to shoppers have been appreciated. Pictures of products have also helped to clear things up.
But it seems that retailers need some assistance accessing and utilizing recall information to better aide consumers.
Recalled products were found on grocery and convenience store shelves after:
- Salmonella bacteria were discovered in Veggie Booty snacks,
- botulinum toxin was found in Castleberry’s chili,
- Topps meat was recalled due to E. coli contamination,
- Listeria monocytogenes was detected in Maple Leaf deli meats, and
- dairy products were found to contain melamine.
Growing up, my brother Skyler had an awesome Batman alarm clock. When it was time to get up, the Bat-Signal would shine on the ceiling and a voice would say, “Gotham City is in trouble; call for Batman!” It was a great call to action.
I think the citizens need another hero: The Recaller.
Along with a handful of producers, some grocery retailers have specialized personnel on staff to manage food safety issues.
Barry Parsons fills that role for the three Stauffers supermarkets in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
When he gets news of a recall, Parsons says,
"Twenty minutes to a half an hour and it's off the shelf."
POW. BAM. WHAP. The threat is negated.
My bother Jesse (currently a third grader) found a hero in Spiderman.
All the aforementioned recalls have shown that the production and distribution of food today has the power to reach and—positively or adversely—affect many, many people. And you know what Uncle Ben says about great power….
"There's a lot of responsibility being in the food business," Parsons said. "I really care about this.
"Because it could be a child. I've had children myself. Imagine if your child got sick. How would you feel as a parent? The elderly — they're susceptible. My parents are in their 80s. That really hits me."
That’s what I see as a culture of food safety.
The superhero I favored was a good guy from Kansas: Superman. 
(At right: Dean Cain's costume from 'Lois and Clark' was on display alongside old mining equipment and [representative] boxes of stored film reels at the Kansas Underground Salt Museum when Bret took me last year.)
The Pennsylvania Recaller says of his position,
"You've really got to be dedicated to it, and you've really got to have a sense of caring.
"You've got to say, 'No matter what's going to happen, I'm going to make sure my customers are safe, my employers are safe.'
"This is not something I do as a job. It's just what I do. It's who I am."
Facing a recall without superhero senses leaves some vulnerable to confusion
I don’t like fresh tomatoes. .jpg)
Generally, my careful avoidance of them is a fairly unique practice. At least, I thought so until I met Bret. We stand together in our quest for vegetables that don't leak acid on the rest of the salad.
We were on our honeymoon when the outbreak of Salmonella Saintpaul in tomatoes and/or hot peppers hit the news. Many people joined our stance on tomatoes then... but it took me a while to realize it.
Since I wasn’t reading FSnet while we were gone, I had to hear the warnings put out on eating tomatoes like a regular consumer would. It was like my superhero senses were turned off.
At the time, I wasn’t in the habit of watching the news. And according to the results of a Rutgers Food Policy Institute (FPI) survey,
“The majority of respondents (66 percent) first heard about the advisory on television.”
Throughout our trip, we ate at cafes, buffets, and casual dining establishments. When we didn’t eat out, we stopped at Wal-Mart for cereal and sandwich supplies. None of those places showed signs of produce being recalled.
The survey found,
“A small minority (8 percent) first heard about it from restaurants and retailers.”
As it happened, some of the first news I received came from my step-dad’s mom, who understood the problem to be in tomatoes sold with the vine still attached.
Hearing through the tomato-vine was problematic, though. I later learned the CDC advised,
“…persons with increased risk of severe infections…should not eat raw Roma or red round tomatoes other than those sold attached to the vine or grown at home…”
Those two words, “other than”, were missed (or misunderstood) at some point in the chain of communication that ended with me.
Lead author of the Rutgers FPI report, Dr. Cara Cuite said in a press release,
“Our results suggest that consumers may have a hard time taking in many details about these types of food-borne problems.”
Almost half (48 percent) of people surveyed indicated they were not sure which types of tomatoes were under suspicion.
I was back at superhero headquarters (i.e. in front of my Mac) when Salmonella Saintpaul was found in a sample of jalapenos from Mexico, and again when the outbreak strain was isolated from a Mexican serrano pepper and the water used to irrigate it.
Most consumers weren't so lucky. From the survey,
“The researchers found that while almost all respondents (93 percent) were aware that tomatoes were believed to [be] the source of the illness, only 68 percent were aware…that peppers were also associated with the outbreak.”
Dr. Cara Cuite commented in the press release,
“This research is especially timely in light of the growing number of recalls as a result of the Salmonella outbreak associated with peanut butter and peanut paste.”
How can consumers be better informed? One practice seen in both outbreaks that helped alleviate some confusion was the use of club membership or “loyalty card” information to contact customers who had recently bought recalled products.
What else can be done to clear things up? After all, regular consumers don’t have superhero senses.
Doggie chips recalled cause of Salmonella concern
Hartz chicken-basted rawhide chips for dogs are being voluntarily recalled due to concerns that one or more bags within the lot are potentially contaminated with Salmonella.
The company announced the recall Friday, saying the two-pound plastic bags of chips with lot code JC23282, UPC number 3270096463 were distributed to a national retail customer it did not identify.
Randy Phebus and I discuss the problems with Salmonella in pet food, treats, and the potential for cross-contamination in the video below.
Aunt Jemima mix recall due to Salmonella
Quick hits on this recall:
1. Interesting to me that the FDA's press release and Quaker Oats press release includes this line (and it is in italics on the FDA site, as to highlight it):
There is very low risk of illness when preparation directions on box are followed and product is not consumed raw or undercooked. Salmonella bacteria is killed at a temperature of 160° F.
After Conagra's meat pie communication I didn't think we'd see consumer control messages like this. I wonder how hot pancakes get? Or waffles, it's kind of hard to use a thermometer on them. I like my waffles kind of light, just cooked enough to not fall apart. Not sure what the literature says on this one.
2. Quaker Oats has great information on their website already (here, at top, and here), with a nice graphic on how to handle the recall. The consumer information on Aunt Jemima's graphic doesn't include the undercooked message that the press releases do. Especially love that people can sign-up for ongoing info -- good preparation on Quaker Oats' part.
Today's ifsn infosheet: ground beef products linked to outbreak
keeping foods separate, using clean equipment and handwashing. You can download the infosheet here.
Food Safety on film
Video Link
iFSN's YouTube profile
OMG! Christmas could be ruined
Reuters is reporting that Godiva Chocolatier is recalling Christmas chocolates in Asia and Europe after two pieces of metal fragments were discovered last month in two boxes of the chocolate made in France and sold in Japan Godiva Chocolatier is a unit of Campbell Soup Co.
Non-O157 STEC meeting
FSIS's press release from October states: "Currently only one strain, E. coli O157:H7 is considered an adulterant in meat. The CDC has reported an increase in the number of non-O157:H7 Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC) infections from 2000 to 2005. Outbreaks from these organisms have been reported in the U.S. since 1990, and foodborne exposures have been suspected in many of these outbreaks.
The purpose of the meeting is to solicit input from academia, consumers, other public health and regulatory agencies and industry on the issue of whether non-O157:H7 STECs should be considered to be adulterants as E. coli O157:H7."
This meeting strikes me as a cool thing -- publicly discussing whether to increase the adulterant list in an open and transparent way. This meeting has led to us to pull together a selection of non-O157 outbreaks (not just the STEC ones), which can be found below, and the USDA has posted a table of 13 non-O157 STEC outbreaks (page 40), which we have reproduced below.
Wonder how the conagra pot-pie outbreak recall/non-recall would have played out had strains of Salmonella been declared adulterants, or if the Topps outbreak driven recall would have changed if E. coli O157:H7 wasn't an adulterant.
For barfblog readers in the D.C. area the public meeting will be held on Wednesday, Oct. 17, 2007, from 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m., at the George Mason University Arlington campus, 3401 N. Fairfax Drive, Room 244, Arlington, Va., 22201.
They call me...Tater Salad.
I was recently a guest at a “welcome back” picnic along with about fifty other students. A few of the dozen or so faculty in attendance grilled up a box full of beef patties and tossed them in a pile for us all to assemble and consume in traditional picnic fashion. I looked them over, picked a luke warm specimen out of the bunch and threw it on a bun with ketchup. But was it done? It certainly looked done, but charred as it may appear, color is no indicator of doneness.
The star of the show, however, was really the five tubs of Kroger brand Mustard Potato Salad lying open on the adjacent table. “Poop Salad" as it was recently dubbed by a ColumbusING blogger from Columbus, Ohio, where E. coli O157:H7 was found in the salads during a routine safety check. This was after the product was distributed and sold, of course. (That’s just the way these things work.) So Kroger did the socially responsible thing and issued a recall in attempt to remove the possibly tainted salad out of the refrigerators of innocent people and dispose of it properly.
So how does a recall happen? The information goes out: newspapers are picking up the story, TV news crews are spreading the word, satellites in outer space are linking up… but people are sitting around eating recalled potato salad like there’s just a little guy in a booth tapping Morse code and sad little beepings just can’t keep up.
It’s sad that it seems so true. Somebody out there is not keeping up. But who? During the recent Castleberry chili recall people were still eating the stuff, not knowing there could be a botulism toxin inside, weeks after the recall was announced.
How do we get people to care about the safety of the food they eat? “I was tainted on a production line (possibly),” the tater salad cries. “You threw me…in-to pub-lic.” But the public isn’t paying any attention.
Casey Wilkinson is an undergrad research student at iFSN, and she loves her mom's tater salad.
