The Associated Press and New York Times just reported on the impetus behind the testing that caused WinCo to issue its large-scale meat recall: us. The positive tests were generated during a study that Marler Clark had comissioned on the presence of E. coli in retail beef samples. The Times reports:
A ground beef recall
Yesterday, WinCo Foods expanded its April 10 ground beef recall to include all ground beef sold at all WinCo stores between March 26, 2010 and April 9, 2010. The original recall included only ground beef sold at the Modesto, California store. The recall was announced after testing at a private laboratory of retail samples of ground beef showed
Counting Friday’s sausage recall by Daniele International, Inc., food companies have recalled at least 2,880,000 pounds of meat products since November 2009 due to contamination by E. coli or Salmonella.
Friday’s recall: (from FSIS press release)
Daniele International Inc., an establishment with operations in Pascoag and Mapleville, R.I., is recalling approximately 1,240,000 pounds of ready-to-eat (RTE)
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FSIS reported today that Huntington Meat Packing Inc., a Montebello, Calif. establishment, is recalling approximately 864,000 pounds of beef products that may be contaminated with E. coli O157:H7. Although the recall is Class I–i.e. associated with a very high risk to consumer health–there are no illnesses currently known to be associated with the potentially contaminated
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Today’s announcement by USDA-FSIS of another beef recall due to E. coli O157:H7 contamination bodes poorly for this new year. Adams Farm Slaughterhouse, LLC., an Athol, Mass., establishment, is recalling approximately 2,574 pounds of beef products that may be contaminated with E. coli O157:H7. The recall occurs in the wake of an epidemiological
Adams Farm Slaughterhouse, LLC., an Athol, Mass., establishment, is recalling approximately 2,574 pounds of beef products that may be contaminated with E. coli O157:H7, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) announced today. A sample of the recalled ground beef tested positive for E. coli O157:H7 in the wake of
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The CDC again amended its case-count in the Fairbank Farms ground beef E. coli O157:H7 outbreak. Secondary DNA tests (surely MLVA) have helped the CDC whittle the number of cases down from 28 in 12 states on November 2, to 26 in 11 states on November 3, to 25 in 10 states today. These changing case-counts got me thinking about an important aspect of every outbreak of foodborne disease: that the number of "confirmed cases" is rarely, if ever, an accurate count of the number of actual victims in any outbreak situation.
The reality of these outbreaks (whether E. coli O157, Salmonella, or anything else) is that the number of people who are actually ill, as opposed to the number who have a stool sample that tests positive, is much bigger than the reports would indicate. In fact, one of the leading studies on the subject suggests that the number of actual victims in a given outbreak, as opposed to merely those with positive stool samples, is as much as 38 times the number of stool sample confirmed individuals.
Continue Reading Fairbank Farms E. coli O157 Outbreak: how many are really ill?
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The CDC did not provide any updated statistics today about the number of people sickened in the ongoing E. coli O157:H7 outbreaks linked to ground beef (still 26 illness in 11 states, with 2 deaths and 3 HUS), but the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) did update the list of retail stores who may
The CDC reports today that there are currently only 26 illnesses in 11 states that are linked to the Fairbank Farms E. coli O157:H7 ground beef outbreak and recall. This represents a reduction in the number of cases attributed to the outbreak by two.
Here is the outbreak rundown:
On October 31, 2009, FSIS
Recently, certain sectors have argued that the incidence of E. coli O157:H7, and other shiga-toxin producing strains of E. coli, in ground beef has dropped precipitously, and that our food safety system is, as a result, working very well. At Marler Clark, over the last several years—in fact, beginning with the infamous Dole baby spinach outbreak in