Yearly Archives: 2015

Family wants answers: Daughter, 5 others stricken with E. coli O157 in 2011 after trip to UK petting farm

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In June 2011, 11-year-old Megan Oldfield took a school trip to a petting farm in East Yorkshire and was left fighting for life with kidney damage.

Megan OldfieldMegan Oldfield needed dialysis for two weeks after contracting the infection following a visit to Cruckley Animal Farm in East Yorkshire.

She fell ill in the week after the school trip and was rushed to Leeds General Infirmary where she was put on dialysis for two weeks.

Megan still needs regular check ups on her damaged kidneys and is vulnerable to further infections throughout her life.

Her dad James, 34, a gas engineer, was quoted as saying, “Seeing my little girl fight for her life because she contracted an infection that might have been prevented was very hard to witness and something I will never forget.

“She went from perfectly healthy to being hooked up to a life saving dialysis machine in a matter of days and nothing could have prepared us for the horrific battle she would have to face.

A Health Protection Agency (HPA) report into the farm the month after Megan’s visit found insufficient hand washing facilities for visitors.

The owners of the attraction – which closed permanently later the same year – deny responsibility.

Megan’s family have now instructed specialist solicitors Irwin Mitchell to investigate the cause of his daughter’s illness.

Lawyers at the firm have received details of a Health Protection Agency (HPA) report into Cruckley Animal Farm which was commissioned following the HPA being notified of ‘six cases (five primary and one secondary) of E-coli O157 with possible links to Cruckley Animal Farm between 7th and 18th July 2011’

The Health Protection Agency report, dated July 2011 found:

  • Hand wash facilities provided were deemed insufficient for the volume

of visitors

  • Location of hand wash facilities also considered not to be adequate,

especially in regard to the covered picnic area, which was located too far from

hand wash facilities

  • As a result, it was considered unlikely that the visiting public washed their hands after interaction with animals and before eating
  • There was a lack of explicit information about the risk of contracting an infection from animals

The HPA report stated: “Two improvement notices were issued which required (a) improved segregation of visitors from animals and increased number of hand washing facilities with hot and cold running water, (b) improved provision of information to visitors.”

The report confirmed that there was strong evidence that the farm was the source of the infection as, “it was the single common link identified in all six cases”.

The HPA concluded: “A lack of explicit information about the risk of infection from animals was also noticed, and this was of concern due to the lack of adequate hand washing facilities in eating areas.”

Hard to change culture: Cats and dogs slaughtered at Chinese dog meat festival despite warnings

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Thousands of cats and dogs have been slaughtered at the Yulin Festival despite government promises to end the practice, which has been condemned internationally on grounds of animal cruelty.

TPGP12122113Hundreds of traders gathered in China’s southern Guangxi province on Sunday for the annual feast, where dogs are served with lychees to mark the summer solstice.

Amid the slaughter, animal activists arrived with cash, saving hundreds of dogs and cats from certain death.

Local authorities failed to honour pledges to ban the festival following an online petition signed by half a million people.

Actor Ricky Gervais and singer Leona Lewis have denounced the festival, where animals are kept dozens to a cage before being electrocuted, burned and skinned alive.

On Sunday, campaigners blockaded streets, raided slaughterhouses and bought animals in an attempt to save them.

“Workers were blow-torching the carcasses to make them shiny and ready for shipment to restaurants,” said Peter Li, a campaigner for the Humane Society China.

 

UK Waitrose free coffee made customer vomit after he drank it

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A Canary Wharf Waitrose customer who vomited after drinking what he thought was free coffee says staff need to heed food safety rules.

waltrose.coffeeGurdeep Singh, who lives on the Isle of Dogs was shopping at the supermarket on Sunday, June 21, when he decided he’d like some refreshment.

The 38-year-old collected coffee from a self-service machine that allows Waitrose customers to get a hot beverage for free, and drank from the cup.

He said: “The coffee was so hot I couldn’t even taste the cleaning fluid.

“I felt ill immediately and was sick in the store.”

Mr Singh said there was no sign on the machine saying it was on its cleaning cycle and there were cups in the dispensing unit.

A Waitrose spokesman said: “We are very sorry to the customer for what was an unpleasant experience that should not have happened.

Ask questions at the farmers market; the grower is (usually) right there

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Where I grew up (Port Hope, Ontario – that’s in Canada), there was a small tailgate farmers market Saturday mornings in the parking lot adjacent to Valu-Mart. My mom and I shopped there sometimes and I never really wondered whether the stuff was safe. I didn’t think a whole lot about food safety and regulation until years later. I figured that if someone could sell it, they must know what they are doing, and I didn’t have to worry about it.

Food safety is all about trust, and I had lots of it.

Screen Shot 2015-06-21 at 9.16.44 PM

As a more mature food safety-focused shopper, I don’t care what size the farm is, where they are located geographically or what their production style is – I only want to know whether the person making what I’m eating can manage food safety risks or not. And whether they do it all the time.

When our group started working with farmers markets a few years ago we created a strong partnership with the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. Together, with funding from the North Carolina Tobacco Trust Fund, we developed best practices and engaged with market managers and vendors through workshops and on-site visits. The focus was to help market folks manage food safety risks – and engage with the interested public around what they do to keep food safe.

The growing trend of farmers’ market shopping allows for direct engagement between producer and eater and when Kim Painter of USA Today asked me about questions I ask when I walk through vendor stalls I told her I go full food safety nerd and ask about handwashing (and other stuff).

Markets are subject to state and local food safety rules, but some practices – including the provision of hand-washing facilities for vendors – should be followed everywhere, says Benjamin Chapman, a food safety specialist at North Carolina State University. Chapman also asks whether workers have had food safety training and how equipment is kept clean. Finally, he asks about farming practices, including how farm water is tested for safety and how farms that raise animals keep animals and their waste out of fruit and vegetable fields. Illness outbreaks have been linked to foods sold at both grocery stores and farmers markets, he says. “I think there’s a perception that the products you would get at a farmers market are safer. But we don’t have that data.”

Click here to check out the asking questions at farmers’ markets infosheet we put together last year.

 

Fathers, mothers and hockey

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One hour on the ice, playing; 90 minutes running a practice; one hour coaching a game.
Father’s Day in Australia, and though the Australian Father’s Day isn’t until September – it’s winter solstice here, not summer – I couldn’t think of a better way to spend the day.

Thanks Amy, for all the skates you did up today and every week.

Thanks for the backyard rink, all those years ago, dad.

soreene.dad.hockey

Sucking air out of a baggie containing raw chicken is beyond dumb

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State-sponsored jazz, NPR, says it’s getting crafty in the kitchen this summer.

bird.bag.sous.videIt’s another triumph of food porn over food safety.

In a story about making magically moist sous vide chicken without the fancy equipment, chef Christina Tosi says consumers can cook chicken with a spiced-buttermilk sauce sous-vide, in just 5 to 20 minutes, with a Ziploc bag.

Judge the recipe for yourselves:

You’ll need a chicken breast or boneless thigh, seasoning of your choice (either salt and pepper or a spice blend), buttermilk (or even bottled ranch dressing), a heavy-duty zip-top freezer bag, and a straw.

  1. Butterfly the chicken breast, or pound it flat, and season.
  2. Put a butterflied chicken breast in a plastic freezer bag with the buttermilk (or ranch).
  3. Seal the bag except for one corner. Insert a straw into the remaining hole and slowly suck out the air with your mouth. Be careful not to suck the sauce into your mouth! Seal the bag to get it as air-free as possible.

Wait, what?

Sucking air out of a bag of Salmonella and Campylobacter is a terrible idea.

And have those zip-lock bags been designed to work at the unspecified higher temperature?

  1. Optional: If you are using thinner storage bags, repeat the process in a second bag, to prevent leaks.
  2. Bring a pot of water nearly to a boil. Set a piece of tin foil in the pot like a hammock (with the ends crimped over the edge).
  3. Plop the bag into the pot of hot — but not boiling — water. The foil will suspend the bag above the bottom of the pot so the bag doesn’t burn.
  4. If the chicken is thin, it will cook (poach, essentially), in five or 10 minutes. An intact chicken breast may take 20 minutes.

You can test the chicken by looking and feeling to make sure it isn’t pink inside.

Wait, what? Color is a lousy indicator. The chicken needs to be temped with a tip-sensitive digital thermometer.

I can’t wait for the next installment.

Global brands stretched by India’s food safety record

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At a McDonald’s plant outside Mumbai, 200 workers walk through air dryers and disinfectant pools, then get to work making the day’s 25,000 patties from chicken painstakingly sourced in a country with one of the world’s worst food safety records.

mcdonald's.india.food.safeTo safeguard its multibillion-dollar brand, McDonald’s says more than 100 checks it applies across its international operations are then carried out after that.

India’s tainted water, patchy cold storage network and a retail sector made up of tiny local grocers present a major risk for international food brands, whose reputation can suffer globally from one local slip.

This can mean educating hundreds of small, often illiterate, farmers – critical in a fragmented farming sector that in some cases still uses “night soil”, or human faeces, for composting.

“There are thousands of farmers you need to reach out to, each with maybe an acre, two acres of land,” said Vikram Ogale, who looks after the supply chain and quality assurance for McDonald’s India.

Swiss food group Nestle is currently battling India’s biggest food scare in a decade and an unprecedented branding crisis in the country, after regulators reported some packets of its noodles contained excess lead, a finding the company disputes.

Its woes have laid bare the risks of operating in a country where it is difficult to build a watertight supply chain, and where state food safety infrastructure is minimal, at best.

Nestle uses external audit firms to check suppliers.

Wal-Mart, which operates as a wholesaler in India, says its checks mean rejecting 10-11 percent of produce daily.

Nestle is now pushing ahead with India’s first ever national recall, pulling some 27,400 tonnes of its popular Maggi noodles off India’s shelves, a process that will take at least 40 days.

 

Oklahoma toddler gets E. coli after splash pad visit

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Kelli Dupuy’s daughter is just 18 months old. At that age, there are a lot of firsts.

“First trip,” Dupuy said. “We went to the splash pad, and she loved it.”

Her first trip to a local splash pad also led to another first.

“The very next day, the next morning she up, and she was sick,” Dupuy said. “Never had been sick. Ever.”

Dupuy took her to the doctor.

“The test came back positive for E. coli,” she said. “It’s fecal matter. How terrifying is that?”

In Canada, don’t battle the Tim: St. John’s food safety company loses billboard battle with Tim Hortons

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I promote marketing microbial food safety, because some companies are better.

I’m just not sure how to do it, because I’m not a marketer.

petroformaBut someone should be able to figure it.

Canada’s largest coffee-and-doughnut chain has won a billboard battle with a St. John’s laboratory that promotes food safety.

Two billboards with similar imagery — but promoting completely different messages about food — were placed side-by-side on Commonwealth Avenue in Mount Pearl this week.

On the left was a sign promoting Tim Hortons’ Canadian Back Bacon Breakfast Sandwich, with an oversized photo of the product.

On the right was a billboard sponsored by Petroforma Laboratories, as part of its invisibleinvaders.com campaign to promote food safety, with a similar image of a burger.

The big difference? The message on the Petroforma billboard was “You can’t taste bacteria,” and the sign featured two “bacteria” peaking out from behind the burger.

That’s what motorists saw as as they drove past on Wednesday, June 17. But by Thursday morning, the Petroforma sign was gone and replaced with a Lasik MD Vision billboard.

The company that rents out the space, E.C. Boone Ltd., admitted Thursday that it made a mistake by placing the two signs next to one another.

A company official, Nathan Anthony, said E.C. Boone received a complaint from a Tim Hortons franchise owner, and quickly removed the Petroforma sign.

Petroforma CEO Mike Hanrahan was not impressed, telling CBC Radio’s On The Go he was offended by E.C. Boone’s response.

Hoped for a more co-operative approach

Hanrahan said it was a case of a large company flexing its muscle, at the expense of a local laboratory trying to raise awareness about the dangers that can be found in kitchens, including food pathogens like Salmonella, E. coli, and Listeria.