Yearly Archives: 2015

barfblog.com 50K+ direct subscribers

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This is a picture of two furry cats and a cute kid. The Internet loves these.

Apparently the Internet is also good for food safety stuff.

I was introduced to Doug by Lindsay Core, a friend who had previously worked for him. Lindsay knew I was desperately looking for a job, and didn’t tell me much else; she just said “I think you two will get along.”sorenne-cats-aug-15

I didn’t really know what that meant, and had no other prospects.

I emailed him, we had an electronic conversation about molecular biology, and he hired me to pull news, alongside a crew of other students.

Pulling news way back then meant that we surfed through the tubes of the interweb for anything food risk-y (microbial food safety, BSE, GMO foods, animal disease) and the stories become the content for daily listservs that was sent out to over 10,000 folks interested in the public discussion. Powell had been doing this 1993.

With the advent of Google and other web apps listserv newsletters became passe and engagement was where we wanted to go.

When self-publishing was all the rage we decided to start a forum to share foodborne illness stories. Every time we talked to someone on a plane, train or automobile and they found out what we did (food safety stuff) they would proceed to share their worst illness story. We wanted to capture those stories, except most people don’t want to be bothered writing, so we did it for them.

But it needed a name.

After one not particularly notable midday pick-up hockey session we had a few beers  with some government- and professor-type friends and brainstormed names.

A creative undergraduate student, Christian Battista, came up with barfblog, and it stuck.

We write it all as one word, in lower case, because capital letters in email are a waste of time.

images-1The idea and technology morphed barfblog away from a just a forum and we created a space to take current news items and highlight what we thought was important – based on the literature and our experiences.

It’s collaborative, a space for discussion and engagement, with a benevolent editorial dictator.

Last week, around the same time we hit 11,000 posts, we surpassed 50,000 subscribers. That’s a lot of folks interested in food safety stuff.

We may not be able to compete with cat pictures, but we know microbial food safety – the things that make people barf.

 

Beef contaminated with E. coli caught before leaving Montana meat plant

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Livestock officials say an equipment malfunction allowed E. coli to survive in beef at a Montana meat plant.

carcass.cow.cleanMeat Inspection Bureau Chief Gary Hamel will report to the Board of Livestock on Monday that contaminated ground beef was identified during a weekly sampling in early June and destroyed. He says none of it was shipped to consumers.

Hamel says a water machine used to clean cow carcasses at the facility was clogged and could not reach a high enough temperature to kill pathogens.

The machine was fixed and the bureau increased inspections at that facility.

Lancashire food hygiene shock as nearly 120 outlets deemed in need of ‘urgent’ or ‘major’ improvements

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Almost 120 food outlets in East Lancashire have officially been deemed in need of ‘urgent’ or ‘major’ hygiene improvements.

fsa.scores.doorsThe fact that so many restaurants, takeaways, cafes and shops come the lowest two of five ratings for a healthy environment has alarmed MPs who care calling for tougher action to improve standards.

Blackburn MP Kate Hollern and Hyndburn’s Graham Jones are urging people to check the national food standards ‘Scores on the Doors’ website before purchasing food.

Out of a total of 4,473 outlets across East Lancashire 117 come in the lowest to two categories – One ‘Urgent Improvement Necessary’ or Two ‘Major Improvement Necessary’.

The worst figure comes from Hyndburn where 44 of 656 premises come in the bottom two scores.

Can phage control E. coli O157 on raw meatballs?

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With an Escherichia coli O157:H7 virulent bacteriophage, M8AEC16, biocontrol efficiency of phages on a highly risky, ready-to-eat, traditional delicacy food called “raw meatball” under different storage conditions was investigated.

bacteriophagePhage, belonging to the Myoviridae family, was isolated from the wastewater of a local slaughterhouse and showed a broad lytic activity toward many E. coli O157:H7 strains with high efficiency of plating and O157 specificity.

Our experimental study provided favorable results, with 0.69–2.09 log colony-forming unit (cfu)/g E. coli O157:H7 reductions in the first 5 h of the replica trials. Major reductions of viable E. coli O157:H7 counts were observed in the beginning of the storage period, reaching up to 1.85 log cfu/g. Although a significant reduction in E. coli O157:H7 was observed with increased phage concentration, storage conditions had minor effect on efficiency of phage biocontrol. This is the first study in Turkey that investigates applicability of phage biocontrol for a traditional food model.

Biocontrol of shiga toxigenic Escherichia coli O157:H7 in Turkish raw meatball by bacteriophage

Wiley Online Library, Journal of Food Safety, 16 AUG 2015

Yilmaz Emre Gencay, Naim Deniz Ayaz, Gizem Copuroglu and Irfan Erol

Various Canadian store-packaged, cooked Chicken Wings recalled due to a toxin produced by Staphylococcus bacteria

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Safeway is recalling various store-packaged, cooked Chicken Wings from the marketplace because they may contain the toxin produced by Staphylococcus bacteria. Consumers should not consume the recalled products described below.

wingrecall1The following cooked products have been sold in Safeway locations in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario.

Recalled products

Brand Name Common Name Size Code(s) on Product UPC
Safeway Party Pack Chicken Wings Hot Salt N Pepper Variable All codes sold up to and including August 14, 2015 236500
Safeway PPK Wings Mix flavors Hot Variable All codes sold up to and including August 14, 2015 256870
Safeway Pinty’s Wings Salt and Pepper Hot Variable All codes sold up to and including August 14, 2015 236524
Safeway Pinty’s Wings Salt and Pepper Cold Variable All codes sold up to and including August 14, 2015 236523

What you should do

Check to see if you have recalled products in your home. Recalled products should be thrown out or returned to the store where they were purchased. Consumers who are unsure if they have purchased affected products should check with their retailer.

Food contaminated with Staphylococcus toxin may not look or smell spoiled. The toxin produced by Staphylococcus bacteria is not easily destroyed at normal cooking temperatures.  Common symptoms of Staphylococcus poisoning are nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramping and fever. In severe cases of illness, headache, muscle cramping and changes in blood pressure and pulse rate may occur. 

Background

This recall was triggered by the manufacturer. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) is conducting a food safety investigation, which may lead to the recall of other products. If other high-risk products are recalled, the CFIA will notify the public through updated Food Recall Warnings.

The CFIA is verifying that industry is removing recalled products from the marketplace.

Illnesses

There have been no reported illnesses associated with the consumption of these products.

Fix it and they will come: Florida shutting down more local restaurants for violations after repairing reporting glitch

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State inspectors are shutting down twice as many Central Florida restaurants for food-safety violations than they did five years ago, and an upgrade to an online-complaint website can take some of the credit.

field.dreamsAn Orlando Sentinel analysis of inspection records showed that state officials issued 139 emergency-closure notices to restaurants between July 2014 and June 2015. That compares with just 67 closures during the one-year period of July 2010 to June 2011.

Other parts of the state have seen the same spike.

In early 2014, the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation fixed a technological shortcoming that allowed only Internet Explorer users to access its online-complaint form, agency spokeswoman Chelsea Eagle said.

That technological foible left the site inaccessible to about 88 percent of Internet users, including those on mobile devices, according to statistics from browser-tracking website StatCounter.

Along with the change to its online-complaint form, the Department of Business and Professional Regulation also created a new system starting in July 2014 that inspected problem restaurants more frequently. Under the old system, every restaurant got two routine inspections a year, Eagle said.

Now those that have been the source of a foodborne illness or have repeat violations get inspected as often as once a month.

A pox of poo on you, soccer star

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Chelsea’s star forward Eden Hazard is no joke. Having created more chances to score last season than any other player in the Premier League, it’s no wonder people have compared him to La Liga greats Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.

D0W30WOr that he was voted the league’s Player of the Year last season. Quite frankly, Hazard is intimidating to his opponents — even Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany, who jokingly said on Friday that he hopes Hazard comes down with messy intestinal issues so that he wouldn’t be able to play on Sunday.

“You’d almost hope that Eden Hazard would have diarrhea,” the defender told Belgium’s Het Nieuwsblad this week (via the Guardian).

‘Impossible to update a facility to control listeria if built in 1950s’ Acme’s new smoking plant

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Due to its ability to grow in the cold and conditions that typically thwart other bacteria, listeria has always been a major concern for the cold-smoked fish industry.

smoked.salmonWith the February opening of a 100,000-square-foot cold-smoking facility in North Carolina, the Brooklyn-based Acme Smoked Fish Corporation hopes to quell those concerns with a raft of new processes to prevent the bacteria’s spread. With a new facility just for cold-smoking, which was designed to reduce possible cross contamination during manufacturing and make equipment much easier to clean, the company now has a much greater ability to control listeria, company R&D senior manager Matt Ranieri told Undercurrent News.

“Now that we have a dedicated facility, we’re able to really control the level of salt. We’re able to really hone in and fine tune in a way that wasn’t possible before because of the equipment,” he said.

The plant, which was built at an investment of $32.2 million according to the newspaper WilmingtonBiz, can process up to 30,000 pounds of smoked fish per day and was designed to isolate critical parts of the manufacturing process.

“It’s impossible to update a facility to the level that you need to control listeria if it was built in the 1950s,” he said.

“No product is released until we have results both from the environment and the product that indicate the absence of listeria,” he said.

Community bands together after E. coli death

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As an Indiana community came together Thursday night to remember 9-year-old Destiny Smith, the State Department of Health says its staff has confirmed three people have been infected with E. coli.

Destiny SmithThe confirmation Friday comes as the department investigates reports of diarrheal illness in three northern Indiana counties.

Health Department officials say the agency is working with public health officials in Fulton, Wabash, and Marshall counties to determine the cause of illness in the three other individuals. The six cases currently known include one death.

Destiny’s family is still confused as to why and how they could lose their daughter so suddenly, but the community held a vigil to celebrate her life.

Full of sunshine, that’s how Destiny Smith’s family and friends would describe her personality.

End-product testing: a necessary evil

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Management of microbiological food safety is largely based on good design of processes, products and procedures. Finished product testing may be considered as a control measure at the end of the production process. However, testing gives only very limited information on the safety status of a food.

devil.south.parkIf a hazardous organism is found it means something, but absence in a limited number of samples is no guarantee of safety of a whole production batch. Finished product testing is often too little and too late. Therefore most attention should be focussed on management and control of the hazards in a more pro-active way by implementing an effective food safety management system.

For verification activities in a food safety management system, finished product testing may however be useful. For three cases studies; canned food, chocolate and cooked ham, the relevance of testing both of finished products and the production environment is discussed. Since the level of control of different processes can be largely different it is beneficial if the frequency of sampling of finished products and production environments would be related to the associated human health risk, which can be assessed on the basis of risk assessment and epidemiological data.

H. Zwieteringa, Liesbeth Jacxsensb, Jeanne-Marie Membréc, d, Maarten Nautae, Mats Peterzf  Revelance of microbial finished product testing in food safety management ,Food Control Volume 60, February 2016, Pages 31–43

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0956713515300918