Food Safety

 

Publisher’s Platform: Salmonella Import Problem

Are there 5,860 sickened? What are Salmonella complications?

by Bill Marler | Apr 29, 2012
Opinion

Collaborative investigation efforts of state, local, and federal public health agencies indicate that a frozen raw yellowfin tuna product imported from India, known as Nakaochi Scrape, from Moon Marine USA Corporation is the likely source of this Salmonella Bareilly and Salmonella Nchanga outbreak.

plateofsushi-406.jpgAccording to the CDC, 190 persons infected with the outbreak strain of Salmonella Bareilly have been reported from 21 states and the District of Columbia. The number of ill persons with the outbreak strain of Salmonella Bareilly identified in each state is as follows: Alabama (2), Arkansas (1), Connecticut (8), District of Columbia (2), Florida (1), Georgia (9), Illinois (15), Louisiana (3), Maryland (20), Massachusetts (24), Mississippi (2), Missouri (4), New Jersey (18), New York (33), North Carolina (3), Pennsylvania (7), Rhode Island (6), South Carolina (3), Texas (4), Virginia (9), Vermont (1), and Wisconsin (15).  10 persons infected with the outbreak strain of Salmonella Nchanga have been reported from 5 states. The number of ill persons with the outbreak strain of Salmonella Nchanga identified in each state is as follows: Georgia (2), New Jersey (1), New York (5), Virginia (1), and Wisconsin (1).  28 ill persons have been hospitalized, and no deaths have been reported.

Past tuna Salmonella outbreaks in United States

Twenty-three were sickened in 2010 with Salmonella Paratyphi B

linked to the consumption of imported, raw, ahi tuna at various locations on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. The product was said to have originated from Asia, and was previously frozen. Concurrent cases of Salmonella Paratyphi B were reported in five other U.S. states, California, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and New York. It was not stated whether these cases were also linked to the consumption of raw ahi tuna.

Four were sickened in 2008 linked to an outbreak of Salmonella Barranquilla among people who had eaten raw tuna or bass fish at a restaurant in Massachusetts.

Forty-four were sickened in 2007 with Salmonella Paratyphi B after the consumption of previously frozen, raw, ahi tuna on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. Additional cases were identified in Colorado and California. The tuna had been sent from Indonesia to a U.S. mainland importer.

 

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USDA Releases More Details About “Mad Cow”

April 28, 2012 By

Cows in the FieldThe USDA has released more details about the case of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), commonly known as “mad cow” disease, that was found in a dairy cow in California. The government said the cow was “humanely euthanized” after it demonstrated “downer” behavior; that is, it stopped walking.

This case was an “atypical case of BSE”, according to the government. That means it was a spontaneous mutation, not the result of the animal contracting the disease through contaminated feed.

BSE is caused by mutated proteins, called prions, which change the structure of the brain. This results in neurological damage. Prions are “a new frontier”, according to veterinarian Dr. Janet Tobiassen Crosby, Guide to Veterinary Medicine at About.com.

Prions, technically known as “proteinaceous infectious particles”, are not alive, so they cannot be destroyed by heat, no matter how high the temperature. Chemical disinfectants do not kill the protein, and irradiation is also ineffective. BSE is a “zoonotic disease”, which means it is shared by human beings and animals. And the prions do not prompt a response in the immune system, so the diseases they cause are fatal.

The disease was discovered because the infected cow was being sent to a rendering plant, and was randomly chosen to be part of a testing program. Dr. Tobaissen Crosby told Food Poisoning Bulletin, “They do ‘random’ testing, so how can they say that it is 100% safe?” The brain sample was tested at the National Veterinary Services Laboratories in Iowa on April 20 after initial results at the University of California-Davis were inconclusive. The USDA’s Animal and Plant Inspection Service announced the test results on April 24, 2012.

 

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ok , just a  side  note here  because  I  am tired  of reading these reports  and  no one  seems  capable  of  calling  them on their  deception.  Part of the  spinal  cord  is  most  definitely put out  for consumption on the market.  The  tail is   definitely  part of  the spinal cord  and many  people   eat  oxtail in many  different  ways.    Who can  say that the  prions  stop at the  spinal  cord and  do  not   infect  in  some  small  way the  tissue  directly  adjacent  to it.    Considering the  fact  that this  disease  is fatal, because there is  no  way  to  kill the  prions, any  risk  is  too  great.   IMHO.

Be  safe  and  ALWAYS do  your   research.

 

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FDA’s New Priorities for Food and Veterinary Medicine

April 28, 2012 By

This week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration released its Final Strategic Plan for 2012 to 2016 to make sure the food supply in this country is protected based on scientific standards. Overall, the government wants to make sure that food for animals and humans is “safe and secure”, that animal drugs are safe and effective, and that food labels are reliable, with useful information.

The plan lays out seven main goals to achieve these results. They are:

  • Establish science-based preventive control standards across the farm-to-table continuum. This should protect food and feed supplies from contamination, and implement and improve preventive control standards.
  • Achieve high rates of compliance with preventive controls standards in the US and internationally. The supply chain should be inspected so standards are met, and collaboration among various agencies should be improved.

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Recalls

 

No Recalls for  today

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Allergen Alert

 

No Allergen Alerts for today

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Articles of Interest

 

 

Letter From The Editor: Just Mad

by Dan Flynn | Apr 29, 2012
Opinion
These should be heady days at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).

cow-mouth-350.jpg

The nation’s $1+ trillion deficit is not much of a speed bump for the $288 billion potpourri we call the 2012 Farm Bill, replenishing the supply of goodies USDA gives out to those who qualify in the 400 pages of legislation.
But crisis management is giving USDA the fits.  First, USDA did not quickly enough explain and defend its decision-making regarding finely textured lean beef, now known the world over as “pink slime.”   By the time USDA got into the arena, it looked too much like a marketing mission.
Since on or about April 18, another crisis management challenge has confronted USDA and they’ve hit a couple bumps on this one, too. That of course was the time when a “downer” dairy cow in Tulare County, CA was put out of its misery and the rendering truck was called.
When the carcass got to the transfer station in Hanford, CA, the rendering company took a brain sample, which was sent off first the University of California, Davis and then to the National Veterinary Services Laboratories in Iowa.
UC Davis was not sure on April 19, but the NVSL found the sample positive for atypical bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) on or after April 20.
The public announcement would not come until mid-afternoon on Tuesday, April 24 and from that moment on mad cow disease — as BSE is nicknamed — was back in the news for the first time in six years.
Now let me step in here.  Not only did this timing get our attention, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which regulated derivatives, wants to know more about when this came down, too.
It’s probably going to come down to when did NVSL know the 10-year, 7 month old dairy cow was positive for BSE, and when did the lab tell John Clifford, USDA’s chief veterinarian?  Then it’s a matter of whether USDA kept the secret while moving quickly to make it publicly known to all.
Before the announcement, cattle markets moved south on mad cow rumors that could have come out of California, the Iowa lab, USDA’s mammoth bureaucracy, or parts unknown.
In this incident, the media keeps finding California sources to fill in details USDA is leaving out. Clifford kept more of a lid on the 2006 BSE case in Texas. That strategy is clearly not working this time.
But putting aside the whole issue of how “material information” that might roil a market was handled, USDA fell down in some other ways too. Ever its public relations team brought Johnson & Johnson through the Tylenol recall almost with a scratch, crisis communications has become its own discipline with some very specific rules.
One of the best lines I’ve heard on the subject come from a crisis communications coach for top CEOs, who said: “You don’t want to be a bystander in your own crisis.”  Much of this advice amounts to making decision-makers understand that in a crisis moving fast with credible spokesmen in all the right venues is critical.  If it’s not done, other messages moves into the vacuum.
That said, we outsiders do not know who is calling the communications shots at USDA.  Is the best advice of the agency communications professional followed by top executives or do the “suits” do what they want.  Not knowing that does not erase the mistakes.
For example:….

Colorado Cantaloupe Growing Season Begins

April 29, 2012 By

It’s the start of a new cantaloupe growing season in Colorado where producers will plant about 2 million acres of the melon with the hope that consumer confidence has rebounded after a Listeria outbreak last year sickened 146 people and killed 35.

Last fall, growers from the region met with Colorado Agriculture Commissioner John Salazar to discuss how to recover from the outbreak fallout.

The Rocky Ford region of Colorado is the birthplace of the U.S. cantaloupe industry. Farmers have been growing Rocky Ford cantaloupes – known for their especially sweet taste, for 120 years. Together with Pueblo county, Rocky Ford produces the bulk of the state’s cantaloupe which, in 2010, generated about $8 million in sales, according to the Colorado Agricultural Statistics Service.

 

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