Yearly Archives: 2015

Foodborne Illness: Consumer Costs, Consequences, and Choices (via The Abstract)

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I’m collaborating with Matt Shipman, public information officer at NC State University and curator of The Abstract, on a set of food safety-related posts from other NCSU folks as we roll toward WHO’s World Health Day on April 7– which is focused this year on food safety. Here’s a post on consumer purchasing issues as they relate to food safety from my friend Kathryn Boys, an assistant professor of agricultural and resource economics at NC State.

Changes to our food system have increased the availability and variety of foods for U.S. consumers, but these changes have also introduced food safety challenges that can have significant impacts on human health and the economy. Researchers are working to develop new food safety tools – and in the meantime there are actions consumers can take to lower their risk of foodborne illness.Boys-Food-Safety-HEADER-848x477

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that 48 million instances of foodborne illnesses occur annually in the U.S., resulting in 128,000 hospitalizations and 3,000 deaths. The value of medical costs, productivity losses, long-term mental and other health impacts, and the costs of premature deaths stemming from these events is substantial. The fourteen pathogens that account for a majority of U.S. foodborne illness have recently been estimated to cost the U.S. economy $14 billion and cause a loss of 61,000 quality-adjusted life years annually.

The potential for a specific foodborne illness outbreak to have a broad and significant impact on human health and the economy is compounded by the integration and globalization of food supply chains. Historically, because of perishability and the fact that produce was predominantly consumed in its raw form, incidents involving produce contaminated in a farm setting would have only affected consumers geographically near the farm. Today, through improved transportation and logistics networks and increased processing, that same produce has the potential to be used in a wider variety of products and affect consumers far from where it was grown.

In addition, identifying the source of contamination may be challenging and time consuming for food wholesalers and other distributors who aggregate products from across many suppliers and who have not implemented traceability practices. And that delay in tracing the source of the contamination means there is more time in which additional consumers may become sick.

When Illness Strikes: Impact on Individual Consumers

A majority of consumers who become ill due to foodborne illness recover at home or with minor medical assistance. In cases of severe illness that can be attributed to either food prepared outside of their home (i.e., restaurants), or contaminated prior to entering their home, consumers may pursue legal remedy for their illness. Information on the number or outcomes of cases settled out of court is not available. We do have some insight, however, of food safety cases settled through jury trials.

Buzby, et al., analyzed federal jury trials (1988-1997) for foodborne pathogens to determine which factors of the incident/case most influenced the trial outcomes. These authors found that 31.4 percent of cases were won by plaintiffs, and juries awarded a median of $25,560 (ranging from $0 to $2.37 million in 1998 dollars). Demographic characteristics of the plaintiff, the ability of plaintiffs to link their illness to a specific pathogen, and the severity of the health impact resulted in higher awards.

Given increasing public and media attention to foodborne illness, continued integration of food supply networks, and improved traceability systems, it is likely that both the number of cases and the amount of these awards will increase over time. I am currently working with collaborators at Virginia Tech and the USDA Economic Research Service to examine this issue.

Foodborne Illness: Preventative Market Measures

Most U.S. consumers have faith in the safety of food supply chain. In general, consumers expect their products to be free from dangerous levels of contamination and to be efficiently recalled if there is a problem. However, the incidence of foodborne illness suggests that problems remain.

Higher levels of food safety can be attained for most food products, lowering the risk of purchasing a contaminated product. But increased food safety comes at a cost.

Research has explored how much more consumers are willing to pay for higher levels of food safety.

In general, findings indicate that U.S. consumers are willing to pay more for higher levels of safety due to risk from microbial, chemical or physical (e.g., metal) contamination. How much more, however, has been found to vary considerably depending on the research setting, the particular food products being studied, the extent of risk reduction, and the research participants’ adherence to safe food handling practices, perception of risk, and demographic characteristics.  The same is true for perceived threats to food safety from other sources.

Consumers concerned about pesticide residues or genetic modification, for example, are willing to pay higher prices for organic and non-GMO foods. Consumer willingness to pay to avoid other food technologies, such as artificial colorants, fruit-ripening technologies, growth hormones and other growth promotants, and nanotechnology (among many others) has been summarized by Lusk, et al.

Consumers interested in decreasing their risk of foodborne illness have the option of buying products from companies with good food safety records, and to keep abreast of product recalls and safety alerts. Once food has entered the home, the food handling and sanitation practices that consumers can take to limit their risk of foodborne illness are generally well known. Information about safe food handling techniques can be found at http://www.foodsafety.gov/index.html.

In the future, additional tools are also likely to be available to consumers. By way of example, food producers often signal the presence (or absence) of specific food attributes through a growing array of food certification and labeling schemes. While at present, there is no label to identify products with higher levels of microbial food safety, it is possible that one may emerge. In addition, human vaccines are currently under development to protect against illness due to Escherichia coli, Salmonella, and Campylobacter. These and other tools are likely to significantly change the food safety market and policy landscape in coming years.

Yeah for whistleblowers: Canadian meat processor expected to plead guilty in E. coli case

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Pitt Meadows Meats is expected to plead guilty on Monday to at least one count of selling E. coli-tainted meat in 2010, CBC News has learned.

pitt-meadows-300One of British Columbia’s largest meat processing plants, which now calls itself Meadow Valley Meats, was charged with 11 counts under the Food and Drugs Act for selling meat unfit for human consumption after a former employee contacted the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

The coverup came to light when Daniel Land, who oversaw the plant’s quality assurance, later contacted CBC News, saying officials at Pitt Meadows Meats told him to keep quiet about the positive test result obtained on Sept. 9. 2010.

Land said a manager failed to report lab results that showed a sample of its product was contaminated with the deadly E. coli O157 strain.

Regulations require federally licensed plants to report such findings.

“They told me that this would be looked after — they would pull it off the shelf,” Land said from his home in Edmonton. “Shame on them. There was tainted meat in the marketplace and they did nothing.”

Land was fired and decided to report the incident to the CFIA, a month after the test came back positive for E. coli.

Federal inspectors shut down the plant for a month and issued a recall, warning consumers that Pitt Meadows beef and lamb products may be contaminated with E. coli and should not be consumed. 

All the products were halal, meaning the animals were slaughtered in accordance with Islamic tradition, and distributed in the Metro Vancouver area.

Pitt Meadows Meats repeatedly described Land as a disgruntled employee who may have tainted the beef himself. 

“That’s a lie. We had a positive E. coli O157,” Land said.

“The meat was out there in the industry. When CFIA got involved and pulled it off shelves the meat was already in stores and people had already consumed it.”

100 sick onboard Celebrity cruise ship

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Up to 100 passengers have are being reported as sick from a possible Norovirus outbreak onboard the Celebrity Infinity.

vomit cruiseAccording to the Centre for Disease Control (CDC) 95 out of 2,117 passengers along with 5 crew members have been reported sick from gastrointestinal illness. The CDC has not yet confirmed that it’s Norovirus but in most outbreaks onboard it usually is. Passengers and crew have been having vomiting and diarrhea.

The CDC has also stated that 8 stool specimens from passenger and crew have been collected for testing. A CDC Vessel Sanitation Program environmental health officer and one epidemiologist are to board the 91,000 gross ton ship once it arrives in San Diego, CA on April 13. The Celebrity Infinity began the voyage on March 29th from Fort Lauderdale, Florida on a 15 night Panama Canal cruise.

Virginia jail helps cook up inmates’ dreams in food safety program

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When I was in jail in 1982, the only food-related job was putting peaches and plums (horse balls) in a can and shipping them to other institutions.

canningI taught school.

But at the Prince William County Adult Detention Center in Virginia the thing they can’t wait to cook up next could be one step closer. In a new program, inmates learn about food and drink safety and — if they pass a test — can go on to earn certification in those areas through the National Restaurant Association’s ServSafe program, he feels as though he can do anything.

“A lot of people sit back and dream,” said Sgt. Allen West, who spearheaded the jail’s ServSafe program. “They’re incarcerated, but there’s a lot of intelligent people here. They just made some bad decisions. So we can help them along and help them be a productive citizen.”

Tru dat.

Rich Holley says: Food irradiation adds cost but makes sense

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Canada was an early adopter of food irradiation, but its status in Canada has remained unchanged for almost 50 years. This article explores reasons for maintenance of the status quo and offers a glimpse of how irradiation can be strategically used to improve the safety of food and the health of Canadians.

Irradiation-beef-Cattlemens-Association-Canada-ionizing-radiation-Ecoli-bacteria-pathogens-EDIWeeklyIf government food safety initiatives and oversight are risk- and science-based in Canada, it is difficult to understand how the current impasse in appraising the application for extended use of food irradiation has occurred. On July 16, 2013, Health Canada granted “expedited status” for the evaluation of a petition from the Canadian Cattleman’s Association (CCA) to use low dose ionizing irradiation to eliminate E. coli O157:H7 from beef.

There has been no meaningful progress to date, and no apparent political will to change that. While the Consumer’s Association of Canada supports adoption of the proposal and is impatient with the lack of progress, Health Canada is reluctant to move forward because of a history of activist opposition to the extended use of food irradiation to other foods1 beyond its permitted use at 0.75 kilogray (kGy) for onions and potatoes, 1.5 kGy for grain and flour, and 10 kGy for spices and dried seasonings. During debates in 1986 and again in 2002 when an initiative for expanded use of food irradiation became a legislative proposal in Canada Gazette Part I, focused opposition led by activists halted its adoption.1 While the CCA petition seems to have been temporarily swept under the rug and although it is hard to determine its status because of regulatory opacity, it appears that there will be little regulatory action until food irradiation is proven harmless to activists. It is uncertain how activists might differ physiologically from the normal consumer; however, it is clear that most are poorly qualified to design, conduct or evaluate scientific work examining the effects of this process on food (Note that issues associated with psychology and psychiatry are beyond the scope of this article).

The scientific basis for the toxicological safety and nutritional adequacy of food irradiated at doses of ≤ 10 kGy has been firmly established as a result of the most extensive body of international research ever accumulated for any food process.2 Doses sufficient for sterilization of food with unaltered sensory characteristics (≤ 60 kGy) were similarly considered acceptable3 and have been used to prepare food for NASA (and Canadian) astronauts for > 40 years. Both Health Canada4 and the CFIA5 have taken positions in support of the use of irradiation to improve the safety of food, but do not permit its use for that purpose in Canada. The safety of irradiated foods has been endorsed by the United States (U.S.) Centers for Disease Control (CDC), the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and is approved for some food use in over 55 countries. Further, the CDC states that “food irradiation is a logical next step to reducing the burden of foodborne disease in the United States”. 6

The greatest potential value from the use of ionizing irradiation to enhance food safety is by treatment of uncooked foods of animal origin, particularly poultry, where “good food” is naturally, unavoidably and consistently contaminated with Campylobacter, Salmonella and toxigenic E. coli (beef), in spite of the best application of good hygienic practices and sanitation in abattoirs and packing plants. With the proliferation of “zero tolerance” rules in North America for pathogens in uncooked foods, the escalating waste and unnecessary cost of recalled animal and plant-based foods because they are not pathogen-free, the use of irradiation becomes an attractive solution. It is ironic that delayed adoption in Canada of expanded animal and plant- based food irradiation and adoption of “zero tolerance” rules have both been driven by “consumer” pressure, which has been fostered by perceived risk to the regulators themselves from the consequences of making either a science-based or politically expedient decision in response to the petition.

The next most strategic target for application of irradiation to improve the safety of food is animal feed. It is folly to ignore the contribution recycling of zoonotic pathogens by feed at both traditional small and large production facilities makes to contamination of human food. It must be remembered that it is within the gastrointestinal tract of healthy domestic animals where pathogens that most frequently cause foodborne illness are resident, multiply and are shed in large numbers from asymptomatic hosts. Irradiation of animal feed would be proactive and complementary to its treatment of food by preventing animal colonization by pathogens, reducing exposure of carcasses to pathogens at slaughter and reducing pathogen contamination of produce by inadequately composted, contaminated manure. Composting can effectively eliminate pathogens from manure but attaining lethal temperatures during the process is unpredictable and almost impossible in most places in Canada during winter. Dependable disinfection of produce cannot currently be achieved by any single treatment (even irradiation) and therefore prevention of contamination is the best, but seldom achieved, option for its safety when used uncooked as human food.

Food irradiation is not a panacea to eliminate foodborne illness but it can reduce its incidence by a substantial proportion and some estimates suggest by 25% if used for poultry, which is the single commodity responsible for most cases of foodborne illness in Canada7 and deaths from foodborne illness in the U.S.8 There are physico-chemical and sensory limits determining which foods can be successfully irradiated to improve safety. At doses effective for controlling bacterial pathogens many dairy products develop “off” flavours and odours caused by lipid oxidation, the whites of treated shell eggs become opaque and less viscous, shellfish (oysters, clams and mussels) die, yielding no advantage, and embryos in treated seeds become non-viable. Except for viruses which are resistant and prions, where the lethal target nuclear material is absent, pathogens can be controlled in most foods at doses ≤ 5 kGy, but if food is frozen or dried higher doses are required. In the U.S., spices and dried herbal seasonings may be irradiated at ≤ 30 kGy for sterilization.6 Although contamination of grains and peanuts by mycotoxigenic fungi can be controlled by irradiation treatment at 5-6 kGy, doses of ≥ 10 kGy are needed to substantially reduce mycotoxin levels in grains.9 Seeds for sprouting may be treated up to 8 kGy6, but in order to maintain the minimum commercial seed germination rate of 95%, lower doses are more practical. In fact, Sikin et al.10 suggested that of all alternatives, including 20,000 ppm chlorine, to ensure the microbial safety of sprouted seeds (a recalcitrant cause of foodborne illness outbreaks), a 50 to 60oC treatment of seeds to be germinated followed by ≤ 2.5 kGy irradiation treatment of the sprouts (mung, radish, broccoli, alfalfa and soy) was the most effective and preserved functional and sensory properties. However, given the small size of individual sprout production operations and their wide geographic distribution, it is unlikely this industry could afford access to irradiation facilities. Fresh produce is increasingly becoming a major contributor to foodborne illness outbreaks, and unlike in Canada where poultry is the leading cause of foodborne illness, leafy green vegetables are the food commodity responsible for causing most illness in the U.S.8 Commercial treatments currently available for disinfecting produce are only marginally effective and irradiation is a viable alternative. Because fresh produce quality is reduced at treatments > 1 kGy, a 220 ppm chlorine wash plus irradiation at 1 kGy11 or a 1 kGy treatment in high oxygen atmospheres12 were the most effective means to assure elimination of both surface and internal pathogen contamination of produce.

Although it is not strictly a food safety application, phytosanitary use of irradiation to control invasive, quarantine insect pests on imported fruits and vegetables has, since 1995, been used on a continuous basis in the U.S. and internationally for mangoes, papaya and a variety of similar products. In Canada, irradiation for insect disinfestation is only permitted for wheat flours and grain at ≤ 1.5 kGy, but for fruits and vegetables lower levels of 0.15 to 0.4 kGy are used commercially with success.13 Because irradiation replaces the use of hot water immersion, heated air and methyl bromide fumigation, which are partly effective or undesirably toxic, the recent growth in phytosanitary use of irradiation can be expected to continue.

A technical problem associated with the more popular use of e-beam irradiation in the U.S. to avoid radioactive waste disposal problems and bad press accompanying use of radioactive isotopes (γ-ray sources) is its low penetrability. Even with double-sided or dual-pass exposures, the thickness of the e-beam target is limited to ≤ 10 cm and this makes it impossible to uniformly treat pallet-sized stacks of packaged food. Although there are also technical and cost issues that need to be overcome, machine generated x-rays are likely to become popular internationally for food irradiation because they have high penetrability, produce no hazardous waste, and the beam generated travels in more controllable parallel lines, rather than dispersed as with γ-rays.13

The claim by activists (Public Citizen) echoed by others (Sierra Club, Food and Water Watch, and the European Civil Society) that irradiation is a “cheap fix” for industry is not borne out by reality. With uncooked foods of animal and plant origin there is no suitable fix available other than irradiation to address “zero tolerance”. In terms of phytosanitary irradiation where alternatives are available for some types of produce to control quarantine insects, they are less expensive than irradiation. Costs of irradiation depend on the dose (type of source) required, proximity to an irradiation facility and throughput. They can range from $0.03 to $1.97/kg ($ U.S.) but can be moderated by efficiencies of scale.13

The formation of compounds (2-alkylcyclobutanones) believed to be uniquely radiolytic in origin and toxic was an objection raised by activists to food irradiation that received attention in earlier discussion. It now appears that they also occur in non-irradiated food14 and may not be acceptable indicators to detect irradiated food, but more importantly this observation minimizes the argument that irradiation does strange things to food. As with any new idea and theory, time is on the side of robust science and eventually will be vindicated.

Objections to the irradiation of food invariably include a call for further whole food (WF) toxicity studies in animals to establish the safety of the process. To date over 30 lifetime WF studies have been conducted involving thousands of animals yielding no measureable effect on safety, yet results were often ambiguous because the studies did not have the sensitivity to identify specific effects of the irradiation treatment. At dietary levels of irradiated components sufficient to test for irradiation effects (chemical changes are so small), an unbalanced diet must be fed, which confounds the outcome.15 With the sophistication and sensitivity of the analytical chemistry technology used today to test for radiolytic products as well as changes in nutrients, unambiguous results are possible and confirm both the nutritional adequacy and toxicological safety of irradiated food, and that further WF toxicity testing is unnecessary.

Summary

While the experimental evidence is very clear that irradiation of food does not produce compositional changes that are of toxicological significance to humans, the controversy continues, fuelled by activists with agenda filled with suspicion of the food industry and regulatory agencies, while “good food” causes 11,000 Canadians to become ill each day16, 2013), and kill an unrecorded number as a result of bacterial pathogens controllable by irradiation. Although I am reluctant to go as far as Farkas and Mohácsi-Farkas2 who suggested that those who provide misinformation about food irradiation are guilty of a form of “terrorism” because they contribute to delayed adoption of a technology that could prevent significant morbidity and mortality, I am disappointed that the evidence to date in Canada shows that the responsible regulatory authority appears reluctant to use available science as the basis for rule making.

References

[1] Gauthier, E. (2010). Social representations of risk in the food irradiation debate in Canada, 1986-2002. Sci. Communication, 32: 295. Available at: http://scx.sagepub.com/content/32/3/295 Accessed Sept. 19, 2014.

[2] Farkas, J. & Mohácsi-Farkas, C. (2011). Trends Food Sci. Technol. 22:121.

[3] WHO (1999). Joint FAO/IAEA/WHO Study Group. High-dose irradiation: wholesomeness of food irradiated with doses above 10 kGy. World Health Organization Technical Report Series 890, Geneva: Available at:

http://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/42203#sthash.xI0bA6J5.dpuf Accessed Sept. 23, 2014.

[4] Health Canada (2013). Food irradiation: proposed regulatory changes-archived. Available at: http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fn-an/securit/irridation/rlo_pres-eng.php Accessed Sept 23, 2014.

[5] CFIA (2014). Canadian Food Inspection Agency. Food irradiation. Available at: http://www.inspection.gc.ca/food/information-for-consumers/fact-sheets/irradiation/eng/ Accessed Sept 23, 2014.

[6] CDC (2014). Centers for Disease Control, USA. Irradiation of food. Available at: http://www.cdc.gov/nczved/divisions/dfbmd/diseases/irradiation_food/ Accessed Sept 23, 2014.

[7] Ravel, A. et al. (2009). J. Food Protect. 72:1963.

[8] Painter, J.A. et al. (2013). Emerg. Infect. Dis. 19:407.

[9] Calado, T. et al. (2014). Comp. Rev. Food Sci. Food Safety, 13:1049.

[10] Sikin, A. M. et al. (2013). J. Food Protect. 76:2099.

[11] Puerta-Gomez, A.F. et al. (2013). Food Control, 31:410.

[12] Olaimat, A.N. & Holley, R.A. (2012). Food Microbiol. 32: 1-19.

[13] Hallman, G.J. (2011). Comp. Rev. Food Sci. Food Safety, 10:143.

[14] Crews, C. et al. (2012). J. Food Comp. Anal. 26:1.

[15] Bartholomaeus, A. et al. (2013). Crit. Rev. Toxicol. 43:1.

[16] Thomas, M.K. et al. (2013). Food. Path. Dis. 10:639.

Department of Food Science,

University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba, R3T 2N2

(*Corresponding author email: rick_holley@umanitoba.ca)

It’s Norovirus and 100 sick: Toby Carvery Exeter recloses today due to “technical difficulties”

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A city pub and restaurant has reclosed, two days after an outbreak of norovirus was confirmed as the cause of it temporarily shutting.

sorry-technical-difficulties-600x337In excess of 100 people are thought to have been affected by the outbreak at Toby’s Carvery at the Exeter Arms, Middlemoor.

The Exeter Arms remains closed.

A spokesperson for the chain confirmed this morning that Toby Carvery re-closed today due to “technical difficulties” – no further details were given.

Organic juice bar employee has hep A in Toronto

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I don’t do juice bars.

big.carrotI’ll take my fruit whole.

And I don’t want it organic.

Toronto Public Health is advising anyone who consumed juice at the Big Carrot organic juice bar located at 348 Danforth Avenue in Toronto, Ontario, between March 17, 2015 and April 2, 2015 that they may have been exposed to hepatitis A.  While the risk is low, individuals who consumed fresh organic juice from this food market during these dates should get a hepatitis A vaccination as soon as possible.

An employee of the Big Carrot organic juice bar is a confirmed case of hepatitis A and anyone who consumed fresh juice at the organic juice bar between March 17, 2015 and April 2, 2015 could be at risk of infection.  Toronto Public Health is asking anyone who consumed organic fresh juice at the organic juice bar during these dates to monitor for signs and symptoms, practice thorough hand washing and contact their health care provider if concerned.

 

Surf, sun and hockey in the Gold Coast: Chinese restaurant serves up menu of monstrosities

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We travelled to the Gold Coast yesterday afternoon for a friendly game with our colleagues by the beach (that’s the Dalgity, brothers, right, celebrating victory).

dalgity.hockey.apr.15Afterwards, a bunch of the families went to a restaurant, but it was not Top One Chinese seafood restaurant which plead guilty in Southport Magistrates Court to breaches of the Food Act after Gold Coast City Council health inspectors found severe shortcomings in food standards.

Raw meat covered with a tablecloth, dirty containers and kitchen bowls ready for use, opened bags of peanuts containing rodent droppings and live and dead cockroaches on the floor were all catalogued by inspectors as the restaurant was slapped with a breach notice for an “unsatisfactory standard of cleanliness”.

Inspectors also noted cockroach body parts, food with no lids and crabmeat stored in uncovered and dirty containers.

221430-953b0b0e-df55-11e4-b60a-424ceb2f883cThe restaurant had also been given four improvement notices over the previous five years.

Representing Top One and licensee Ricky Kwok Fai Wong, lawyer Mark Fitz-Walter said the restaurant’s managers had already taken steps to ensure there were no further breaches, including hiring a health consultant.

Magistrate Dermot Kehoe fined the restaurant $22,500, plus costs.

Can humans get Norovirus from their dogs?

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Human norovirus may infect our canine companions, according to research published online April 1 in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology, a publication of the American Society for Microbiology.

sadie.dog.powellThat raises the possibility of dog-to-human transmission, said first author Sarah Caddy, VetMB, PhD, MRCVS, a veterinarian and PhD student at the University of Cambridge, and Imperial College, London, UK. Norovirus is the leading cause of food-borne illness in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The research showed that some dogs can mount an immune response to human norovirus, said Caddy, who will be a junior research fellow at the University of Cambridge, beginning in August. “This strongly suggests that these dogs have been infected with the virus. We also confirmed that that human norovirus can bind to the cells of the canine gut, which is the first step required for infection of cells.”

Caddy and collaborators performed the latter research using non-infectious human norovirus particles, which consist solely of the virus’ outer protein, called the capsid. The capsid is the part of the virus that binds to host cells. By itself, it is non-infectious because it lacks genetic material. (The non-infectious capsid is the basis for a new norovirus vaccine which is being tested in clinical trials, said Caddy).

Nonetheless, it is not clear just how much of a problem canine infection and transmission may represent for humans, said Caddy. Despite dogs’ apparent susceptibility, the investigators failed to find norovirus in canine stool samples, including those from dogs with diarrhea. They found it in serum samples of only about one seventh of 325 dogs tested.

Additionally, it is not yet known whether human norovirus can cause clinical disease in dogs Assuming that dogs become infected with human norovirus as per this study, it also remains unknown whether they could shed the virus in quantities sufficient to infect humans—although clinical investigators have estimated that as few as 18 virus particles can cause human infection.

Moreover, it is yet to be determined whether dogs play a role in the epidemiology of some outbreaks of human norovirus. Some of the biggest outbreaks occur in places from which dogs are absent, such as on cruise ships and in hospitals.

D.C. Target’s grocery area shut down after health violations, including rodent droppings

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D.C. residents who like to do their grocery shopping at Target need to find another place to purchase their food for now.

rat.droppingsThe D.C. Department of Health suspended the retailer’s license at its Columbia Heights store after it failed a health inspection Thursday afternoon. Inspectors found a number of violations throughout the store, including rodent droppings in the back storage area, according to Ivan Torres, a spokesman for the D.C. Department of Health.

The fresh grocery area of the store and the pizza cafe, which serves hot prepared food, are closed. All other parts of the store are still open.

“At Target, food safety and quality are a top priority,” a Target spokesman wrote in an email. “We take this issue very seriously and are working with officials to address any concerns as quickly as possible.”