The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has issued an alert for cheese products thought to contain Listeria monocytogenes. The products are certain Deschamps brand and Fromagerie Marie Kadé brand cheese these products have been distributed in Quebec and Ontario. There have been no reported illnesses but these products have possible contamination.
Posted in Food Illness, Food Poisoning, Food Testing, Listeria, Microbiology, outbreak
An outbreak of Shigella sonnei in Norway has been linked to fresh basil used in making pesto, there were 46 cases have been detected the product has been withdrawn from the market. The link above describes the investigation that was undertaken.
Posted in Food Illness, Food Poisoning, Microbiology, outbreak
Schreiber Processing Corporation have recalled some broiled chicken liver products linked to a cluster of Salmonellosis illness around New Jersey and New York, the products appear to be cooked but do in fact require further cooking before consumption. The serotype implicated is Salmonella Heidelberg, the full article can be found at the link above.
Posted in Food Illness, Food Poisoning, Food Testing, Microbiology, outbreak, Salmonella
Food Production Daily has reported that food recalls in the US were up by six fold between July and September with Listeria accounting for 25% of the recalls. Although recalls due to Salmonella had reduced. The report also goes into further detail of other reasons for product recall.
One of the thoughts that I had on this was that perhaps the switch to ‘zero’ tolerance for Listeria monocytogenes, much talked about in the UK and Europe had been introduced in the US. Therefore it is probably not surprising that recalls based on possible Listeria contamination had gone up. This along with the recent cantaloupe outbreak which has left 29 dead.
RTT News has reported that Texas food company Whittington’s has recalled some beef jerky products in Texas after possible Salmonella contamination was discovered during a routine inspection by an official body.
The FSA are warning people about Salmonella contamination of Paan/Betel leaves, since August a large proportion of these leaves imported from India and Bangladesh have had Salmonella contamination. Although no illness has been recorded yet border agencies and high commissions have been put on alert.
Posted in Food Poisoning, Food Testing, Microbiology, outbreak, Salmonella, Uncategorized
The CDC has published some information about estimated food illness in the USA for 2011, it concludes that 48 million people in the USA will get ill, 128,000 will be hospitalised and 3,000 will die.
Posted in Food Illness, Food Poisoning, Microbiology, outbreak
This food safety management pack has been developed by the FSA to help retail businesses across the UK comply with food hygiene regulations. It can be downloaded from the link to the FSA web site and you can also order packs from that page as well.
Posted in Food Illness, Food Poisoning, Microbiology, outbreak
The number of deaths from the Listeria outbreaks in cantaloupes has risen to 28 according to the CDC. In addition to this the CDC has reported that one pregnant women has miscarried as a direct effect of the infection.
Posted in Food Illness, Food Poisoning, Listeria, Microbiology, outbreak
A batch of olives produced in Italy has been withdrawn from sale in the UK after two people in Helsinki, were diagnosed with botulism.
Gaudiano Organic Olives Stuffed with Almonds were implicated in the two cases and the toxin was confirmed to be present in the jars by laboratory testing. The olives in question are in glass jars with a ‘best before’ date of 09/2012.
Only one company in the UK is known to have imported the Olives and that is Greencity Wholefoods of Glasgow which imported 40 jars. They came into the country in September 2010 and sold on, there are no more of this product on sale and no cases of botulism have been reported in the UK.
Jars with the stated BB date should not be opened or consumed.
Posted in Food Illness, Food Poisoning, Food Testing, Microbiology, outbreak
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