E. Coli Outbreak Investigation Tries To Solve Mystery By Turning Focus To Nestle Flour Supplier
Nestle USA’s flour supplier for its Danville, VA cookie dough plant is now the focus of a joint investigation by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.
The name of the flour supplier was not made available.
FDA found the E. coli O157:H7 bacteria in samples of the prepackaged Nestle Tool House refrigerated cookie dough, but inspections inside the Danville plant found no traces on equipment or workers.
As result, FDA is turning to individual ingredients beginning with the flour in hopes of finding out how a deadly bacterium from the intestines of cattle came to be found in raw cookie dough.
The contaminated Nestle cookie dough is now blamed for infecting 72 people in 30 states with a strain of E. coli O157:H7 with a common DNA fingerprint. Fifty-one have been confirmed by advanced testing and additional confirmatory tests results are pending on the others.
The E. coli outbreak forced Nestle to recall an estimated 300,000 cases of the popular Toll House cookie dough, or 3.6 million individual packages.
The victims range in age from 2 to 65 years old. Most (71 percent) are female, and 65 percent are under 19 years of age. While no deaths have yet been attributed to the outbreak, 34 have been hospitalized and ten have developed the often life-threatening hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS).
The number of infections is also continuing to rise.
Food safety attorney Bill Marler, managing partner of the Seattle law firm of Marler Clark, is urging Nestle to immediately begin paying the medical bills and lost wage claims of all legitimate victims of the outbreak. Marler has already sued Nestle on behave of victims in Colorado, California and Washington State.
“True, it will not completely prevent Nestle from being sued to both uncover why the outbreak happened and to deal with the suffering of the victims and the need for possible future medical expenses that might well include life time monitoring, kidney dialysis and transplant, but it certainly will not hurt, “ says Marler.
Yesterday, the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service issued a largely useless, but still widely published, news release entitled “Independence Day: Drills for the Grill.” See News Release, .png)
However, there is more to do. According to the CDC, as of Thursday, June 25, 2009, 69 persons infected with
E. coli O157:H7 was found today at the Danville, Virginia plant Nestle makes Toll House Cookie Dough. According to Brian Hartman of
The recent (and still unfolding) E. coli O157:H7 outbreak linked to contaminated Toll House cookie dough manufactured by Nestle has no shortage of lessons to teach, including the reminder that this deadly pathogen can find its way into nearly any food product if sufficient care is not taken during its manufacture. But this sad outbreak is also a case study in the ridiculously complicated, and too-often ineffective, state of food safety inspection in the United States. What makes the outbreak such an excellent case-study is the fact that the Nestle plant located in Danville, Virginia was not only manufacturing Toll House cookie dough products, but also a variety of Buitoni flat and stuffed pastas, and pasta sauces. This made the plant what is called a “dual jurisdiction establishment” that fell under the regulatory authority of both the FDA and the USDA. And to make things even more interesting, Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (VDACS) was performing routine plant inspections under contract with the FDA. So how come with all these agencies involved no one prevented the outbreak?
By way of background, the FDA has jurisdiction over all domestic and imported food products, except meat, poultry, or processed egg products, which fall under the jurisdiction of the USDA. But not all food products fall neatly on one side of the jurisdiction line or the other. For example, the products that Nestle manufactured for its Buitoni-brand fell on both sides of the line, with a few falling almost on the line. Meat-flavored pasta sauce would be inspected by the FDA, while meat sauce containing 3% or more of meat would be inspected by the USDA. The ravioli stuffed with cheese would be the responsibility of the FDA, while those stuffed with pork or prosciutto would be the responsibility of the USDA. Thus, if you look at the FDA Inspection Report from September 11 and 12, 2006, you will see that the inspector takes note of fettuccini and linguine being manufactured (FDA products), and chicken tortellini being manufactured (USDA product). Only the Toll House cookie dough products feel solely within the jurisdiction of the FDA. Nonetheless, the FDA plainly took note of all products being manufactured, without, however, making mention of whether or how what was found would be communicated to the USDA. Of course, since the USDA had an inspector onsite, and the FDA showed up in the plant only every year or so, it is the USDA that presumably knew much more about the plant.
As I expected, my friends were shocked that I would "ruin" a hamburger by fully cooking it. They enjoy their burgers cooked medium, and two of them swore that they had eaten the best hamburger they had ever had the night before meeting me for lunch.
Fortunately, no illnesses have yet been linked to the recall. The recall was initiated when the FDA inspected the Plainview facility and "found that some of the equipment was contaminated with Salmonella." The FDA was inspecting the plant as a result of testing done by the USDA that found Salmonella in a company product not intended for retail sale.
In the early morning hours of Sunday, June 28, the JBS Swift Beef Company expanded the earlier recall of 41,280 pounds of beef contaminated with the highly toxic pathogen E. coli O157:H7 to include an additional 380,000 pounds. The beef recalls are FSIS Class I, meaning the “use of the product will cause serious, adverse health consequences or death.” The company and The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) have made available a list of recalled products, but so far have refused to reveal where those products were shipped, even in light of illnesses linked to the meat.