April 2006

Perdue Farms, Inc., a Monterey, Tennessee, establishment, is recalling approximately 20,610 pounds of fully cooked breaded chicken breast fillets due to possible underprocessing, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) announced today.
The following product is subject to recall:
10-pound cases, consisting of two five-pound bags, of fully cooked “PERDUE, BREADED…

Sarah Barry of DailyProgress.com (Virgina) reports that more than 40 members and guests of Farmington Country Club came down with upset stomachs on Easter, creating a mystery officials are still trying to solve.
As of Wednesday, the Charlottesville-Albemarle Health Department had not been able to identify the cause of the illnesses, said Roy Crewz, spokesman for the Thomas Jefferson Health District. “All of our information right now is very preliminary,” he said.
Two days after the club held an Easter brunch buffet, it began receiving phone calls from members and guests complaining of symptoms consistent with food poisoning.Continue Reading Country club struck by odd illness

Sharon Cohen of the Associated Press reports that Martin Cortez works in a world of long knives and huge saws, blood and bone, arctic chill and sweltering heat. This is life on the line as a meatpacker.
It’s no place for the squeamish. Some workers can’t stomach the gore — chopping up the meat and bones of hundreds of cattle, day after day. Cortez has been at it more than 30 years. It also can be very dangerous. Some workers have been slashed, burned or scarred. He has not.
Even so, Martin Cortez, a soft-spoken man with sad eyes, doesn’t recommend the work. The thrashing animals, the heavy lifting … all that goes into putting steak and hamburger on America’s dinner tables, he says, makes for a backbreaking day on the killing floor.Continue Reading Meatpacking-A new jungle?

The Asahi Shimbun reports that nearly four decades have passed since the nation’s worst outbreak of food poisoning. In 1968, thousands of consumers were sickened as a result of tainted cooking oil manufactured by Kanemi Soko Co. Symptoms included black acne-like rashes all over the face. With the passage of time, public memory of the disease is fading.
About 14,000 people who ate food cooked in oil made by the Kita-Kyushu-based company developed cancer or experienced major problems with their internal organs. The poisoning caused many stillbirths as well as premature deliveries. Poisoning cases occurred across wide areas of western Japan.Continue Reading Mass food poisoning

Food Safety Research Consortium (FSRC), a multi-disciplinary collaboration among seven US universities and research institutions, announces an international conference organized jointly with MED-VET-NET, the EU Network of Excellence for zoonoses and foodborne disease research. The conference, titled “Priority Setting of Foodborne and Zoonotic Pathogens,” is aimed at promoting progress in food safety priority setting by identifying key scientific issues and opportunities and by fostering international scientific collaboration.
Continue Reading International conference: Priority Setting of Foodborne and Zoonotic Pathogens

Rosie Lerner of Purdue University Extension reports that gardeners long have used manure from various farm animals to fertilize and enrich their soil. However, recent public awareness of food-borne illnesses has left many gardeners wondering if using manure is safe.
There are a number of pathogens, including E. coli, salmonella and listeria, that can be transferred to humans from animal manure. Some manures also may contain parasites, such as roundworms and tapeworms.
If fresh manure is applied to the garden or compost pile, there is a high risk of causing illness to the gardener, as well as anyone eating fresh produce from that garden. Fresh manure also can be harmful to growing plants, due to being too high in available nitrogen, thus burning roots.Continue Reading Get the scoop on poop — er, garden fertilizer

VietNamNet reports that cases of food poisoning have soared as summer approaches, and the Ministry of Health is pushing April as the Month for Food Safety.
The Anti-Poison Centre at Bach Mai Hospital receives several cases of food poisoning each day, often from street food. On April 8, the day the Ministry of Health launched…

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a report on April 14 titled, Preliminary FoodNet Data on the Incidence of Infection with Pathogens Transmitted Commonly Through Food – 10 States, United States, 2005. FoodNet collects data from 10 U.S. states regarding diseases caused by enteric pathogens transmitted commonly through food. This report describes preliminary surveillance data for 2005 and compares them with baseline data from the period 1996-1998.
Continue Reading The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)

Per the CDC, on March 15, 2006, multiple persons with symptoms of nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and dyspnea visited the emergency department at Baan Luang district hospital in Nan province, Thailand; one person required mechanical ventilation. A team from the Bureau of Epidemiology, Department of Disease Control, Thailand Ministry of Public Health (MOPH) initiated an investigation, in collaboration with the Surveillance and Rapid Response Team from Baan Luang district. This report summarizes the investigation conducted during March 15–26, which determined that the outbreak was caused by foodborne botulism from home-canned bamboo shoots and affected 163 rural villagers who shared a common meal. The last case was identified March 21; no further cases of foodborne botulism have been identified in the region.
Continue Reading CDC: Botulism from home-canned bamboo shoots

Ahmed ElAmin of Food Production Daily reports that by next month food companies will be required to have more explicit instructions that uncooked, breaded or boneless poultry products need to be cooked.
The new requirement was sparked by a recent food recall due to consumer confusion over whether such products needed to be cooked. The product led to a number of people falling sick from Salmonella enteritidis.Continue Reading Revised labelling required for poultry products