Salmonella Blog - Surveillance & analysis on salmonella news & outbreaks

A recent editorial commentary by the Pittsburgh Post Gazette addresses the recent incidents of food-borne disease, particularly those involving produce in restaurant chains such as Taco Bell.

Despite more than 12,000 food-processing plants in the United States, says the editorial,  the budget of a key federal watchdog, the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, has been cut by 37 percent since 2003.

Last year, the agency conducted 4,573 inspections. The goal this year: 3,400. While the number of federal inspectors and inspections is declining, the number of illnesses linked to produce have jumped sharply, doubling between 1998 and 2004.

The editorial further goes on to say that “The fragmented approach to food safety must be streamlined and bolstered if the public is to be protected. E. coli and other pathogens don't merely give people a stomach ache; they can kill,” and urges Congress to prepare to make the changes necessary to retain public confidence in the safety of the nation's food supply.
 

Caroline Smith DeWaal, director of food safety at the Center for Science in the Public Interest, commented in a recent TomPaine.com editorial in regards to the need for Americans to eat for fresh fruits and vegetables, and how the recent food poisoning outbreaks are hindering that message.

“Contaminated foods kill about 5,000 Americans each year, and sicken another 76 million, according to the Centers for Disease Control,” says DeWall. “While the numbers seem enormous, what often isn’t counted is the cost to survivors, who sometimes suffer loss of kidney function, miscarriage, colitis or reactive arthritis after a bout of food poisoning. The liability costs of the recent spinach outbreak may well exceed $100 million, money that should have been invested in preventing the outbreak with more effective oversight of growers.”

She then outlined CSPI’s recommendations of several policy options that she feels would help plug gaps in the food safety system:

•    Congressional funding for the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition to reflect the growing demands on the agency.
•    Improvements in food-safety conditions on the farm by designating one agency to promulgate regulations for and conduct inspections of America’s farms.
•    A modern food safety law to supplant the “current hodgepodge of laws”, some of which were enacted 100 years ago.
•    The creation of a single food-safety agency, with the authority to recall food from the market and to penalize companies that produce contaminated products.

 

Almond Board of California's proposal to create a mandatory pasteurization program to eliminate the potential for salmonella bacteria in California almonds is one step closer to reality.

After two years of research and consultation involving California’s annual $2.5 billion almond industry, the plan is designed to negate future chances of California almond-caused salmonella outbreaks.

For handlers who are shipping raw almonds directly into consumer channels whether to a retailer or a manufacturer who repacks them, the almonds must be pasteurized before leaving the handling facility.

Two exceptions would exist: unpasteurized almonds shipped directly to a manufacturer in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico with the manufacturer having submitted an application and qualified for direct verifiable user status by the Almond Board; and unpasteurized almonds shipped to other export markets. Cartons, bins, and boxes would require unpasteurized labeling under the exceptions.

The ABC will conduct compliance visits with additional help by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s inspection service.
 

Eighty-three percent of chicken sold in U.S. grocery stores may contain bacteria that cause foodborne illnesses, a consumer group said on Monday. That number is 34 percentage points higher than the rate it found three years ago.

Consumer Reports said tests on 525 chickens - including samples from leading brands Perdue, Pilgrim's Pride Inc. and Tyson Foods Inc. - showed most of the poultry had campylobacter or salmonella, two of the leading causes of food-borne diseases.

"We think it's really startling," said Jean Halloran, a policy director for Consumers Union, which publishes Consumer Reports. "It's a very significant deterioration in food safety."

A spokesman with the U.S. Agriculture Department's Food Safety and Inspection Service said the study was riddled with flaws such as a small sample size and uncertainty over the report's methodology.

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention estimated the two bacteria, which can be spread through other avenues in addition to chicken, cause millions of illnesses and 700 fatalities annually.
 

After 15 students at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, visited the emergency ward, they tested positive for the same strain of Salmonella. A link was made to raw bean sprouts, and the city decided on Nov. 23, 2006 to warn the public, according to Douglas Powell of the Food Safety Network.

As part of the warning, Dr. Sheela Basrur, Ontario's Chief Medical Officer of Health, advised the entire province not to eat raw or cooked bean sprouts, including those from grocery stores, home refrigerators or those served at restaurants.

As the number of confirmed sick people rose into the hundreds, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency on November 25, 2005, finally issued an advisory for mung bean sprouts manufactured by Toronto Sun Wah Trading Inc. -- the largest sprout growth facility in the province.

The consumption of raw sprouts has been linked to over 30 outbreaks of foodborne illness throughout North America in the past 15 year affecting tens of thousands of people.

Sprouts, by nature, present a special food safety challenge because the way they are grown.  High moisture and high temperature makes it an ideal environment for bacterial growth. Sprouts are also impossible to wash, making CFIA's standby warning to consumers to wash their produce extremely difficult to follow.