| Issue Date | 23.4.2018 |
|---|---|
| Source of Information | The Food and Drug Administration of the United States |
| Food Product | Romaine lettuce |
| Product Name and Description | Romaine lettuce produced in the State of Arizona, the United States (US) |
| Reason For Issuing Alert |
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| Action Taken by the Centre for Food Safety |
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| Advice to the Trade |
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| Advice to Consumers |
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| Further Information | The CFS press release |
Risk-based approaches are important for ensuring meat safety.
Advances in pathogen typing allows for determination of contamination pathways.
Omics tools have great potential to redefine microbial foodborne hazards in meat.
New tools will provide greater knowledge for more robust risk-based management.
Meat has featured prominently as a source of foodborne disease and a public health concern. For about the past 20 years the risk management paradigm has dominated international thinking about food safety. Control through the supply chain is supported by risk management concepts, as the public health risk at the point of consumption becomes the accepted outcome based measure. Foodborne pathogens can be detected at several points in the supply chain and determining the source of where these pathogens arise and how they behave throughout meat production and processing are important parts of risk based approaches. Recent improvements in molecular and genetic based technologies and data analysis for investigating source attribution and pathogen behaviour have enabled greater insights into how foodborne outbreaks occur and where controls can be implemented. These new approaches will improve our understanding of the role of meat in foodborne disease and are expected to have a significant impact on our understanding in the next few years.
NEW ORLEANS — Viruses engineered into “nanobots” can find and separate bacteria from food or water.
These viruses, called bacteriophages or just phages, naturally latch onto bacteria to infect them (SN: 7/12/03, p. 26). By tweaking the phages’ DNA and decking them out with magnetic nanoparticles, researchers created a tool that could both corral bacteria and force them to reveal themselves. These modifications can boost the sensitivity and speed of rooting out bacteria in tainted food or water, the researchers reported March 20 at the annual meeting of the American Chemical Society.
“You’re taking the power of what evolution has done … to bind bacteria, and then we’re just helping that out a little bit,” said Sam Nugen, a food and biosystems engineer who leads the team designing these phages at Cornell University.
Posted in Uncategorized
An outbreak of unknown etiology has sickened dozens on the campus of Western Connecticut State University (WCSU) and to date the source of the outbreak has not been pinpointed.
This outbreak is not believed to be connected with the national E. coli outbreak. Only two incidents of E. coli illness have been reported in Connecticut, and not in the Danbury region.
Any students who visit a doctor because of symptoms is asked to request tests, including an enteric bacterial stool culture and Norovirus testing. The WCSU Health Services hopes to speak to any student who became ill in order to identify the type of illness and potentially its source.
Sanitation of common areas on both campuses was completed Sunday. The cafeteria on the Westside campus was closed and cleaned Saturday, with reopening set for Sunday. The Midtown cafeteria will be closed and cleaned Sunday. As an additional precaution the university threw out all the food in the Westside cafeteria on Friday.
The police is investigating the poisoning of 15 children in Sievierodonetsk, as Tetyana Pokhukay, the Spokesperson of Luhansk Head Department of the National Police wrote on Facebook.
“Today children from different cities and regions participated in children’s event when they consumed prepared breakfasts. A couple hours later 15 out of 22 children were hospitalized,” she said.
Posted in Uncategorized
Gaya: 71 people fall sick due to food poisoning At least 71 people, including children complained of loose motions, vomiting and other food poisoning symptoms after consuming food at a wedding function and were brought to a hospital in Gaya.
District Magistrate Abhishek Kumar Singh said, ‘We received a complaint regarding food poisoning.
The condition of the people is stable as of now and they are kept under medication.’.
Consumers should now avoid all types of romaine lettuce, the CDC informed us, based on “new information” in the E. coli O157:H7 HUS outbreak that has sickened dozens in 16 states. That information came from Alaska, where an E. coli O157:H7 Outbreak at the Anvil Mountain Correctional Center, which sickened 8 people, was linked to whole romaine lettuce heads.
Health officials in Indiana are urging residents to get vaccinated and take other steps to protect themselves from hepatitis A if they plan to travel to states that are experiencing outbreaks of the disease.
The Toledo-Lucas County Health Department has confirmed a case of hepatitis A in a food handler at Dave & Buster’s restaurant on Monroe Street, the department said Thursday.
Kentucky officials say three deaths have now been reported in a hepatitis A outbreak in six counties.The number was released Friday, along with a total number of cases of 352, through last Saturday. The state Department of Public Health recommends hepatitis A vaccinations for children older than 1 year and adults living in Jefferson, Bullitt, Hardin, Greenup, Carter and Boyd counties.
Salt Lake County Health Department (SLCoHD) announced today that people who consumed any food item from the Edible Arrangements store at 5211 South State Street in Murray between March 21 and April 13 may have been exposed to hepatitis A. This possible exposure affects only this Edible Arrangements location; health officials estimate that this store sold about 600 arrangements during this time.
HELSINKI, April 21 (Xinhua) — While Finland has been renowned for clean pork industry, a key piggery associated with the Finnish meat production company Atria was hit with salmonella, media reports said on Saturday.
In the affected farm, 2000 sows are being slaughtered as the salmonella bacteria has spread throughout the buildings and a quarantine is not feasible. The farm is a “sow facility” where 60,000 bigs are born annually to be sent to other facilities to grow.
Authorities have not identified the farm, under privacy rules, but MT said it is in southwestern Finland. The bacteria type is Thymiurum FT U 277 and has been spread with birds and mice.
Atria has assured no salmonella contaminated pork has gone to customers. Corpses are destroyed at a special facility.
The facility affected is one of the largest in Finland. Atria assured the mass slaughters will not result in any immediate shortage in its merchandise, but may be seen next winter season in the availability of Christmas ham.
Posted in Salmonella, Uncategorized
New measures will be introduced before summer to put an end to a scam that has swindled Spanish hotels out of millions
The British Ministry of Justice has announced new rules to stop British holidaymakers in Spain from scamming tour operators with fake food poisoning claims.
Under the crackdown, a limit will be set on the legal costs that can be claimed in overseas package travel claims. This will stop claims management companies from seeking legal costs that are out of proportion to the damages sought – a loophole that has often pushed tour operators to settle out of court.
Claiming compensation for being sick on holiday, when you haven’t been, is fraud
British Justice Minister Rory Stewart
In a press release, the Ministry of Justice said the change “would mean tour operators would pay prescribed costs depending on the value of the claim and length of proceedings, making defense costs predictable and assisting tour operators to challenge bogus claims.”
