As of Wednesday, 14 people – 11 children and three adults – are believed to have contracted E. coli after visiting the Main Beach and, in many cases, ingesting lake water, according to the Nevada County Public Health Department. Lab results so far confirm 11 of those 14 cases are connected to the lake’s bacteria.
By Tuesday, nine people had been hospitalized in connection with the outbreak, county Public Health Coordinator Patti Carter said. Six had been discharged by Wednesday evening.
Four sickened children developed a serious condition called hemolytic uremic syndrome, which can lead to potentially fatal kidney failure and anemia.
I enjoy working in the field of public health, it’s challenging and exciting. I have had the opportunity to work with some incredible epidemiologists, public health inspectors, and public health nurses, the work they do is critical during outbreaks. I have had some experience dealing with foodborne outbreaks of Hepatitis A and due to its long incubation period, it’s a nightmare trying to get information from ill persons to identify a common source.
Outbreak News Today reports
In a follow-up on the hepatitis A outbreak in San Diego County, CA, the number of cases reported this year has climbed to 312, including 10 fatalities, according to latest health department data. Of the cases, nearly seven out of 10 patients required hospitalization for their illness (215). The County of San Diego Health and Human Services Agency says the investigation into the outbreak is ongoing. It has been challenging because of the long incubation period of the disease (15 to 50 days) and the difficulty experienced to contact many individuals sickened with the illness who are homeless and/or illicit drug users. To date, no common source of food, beverage, or other cause has been identified; as a result, the source of the outbreak remains undetermined.
Stephanie Strom of the NY Times writes that one of the chief selling points of the Impossible Burger, a much ballyhooed plant-based burger patty, is its resemblance to meat, right down to the taste and beeflike “blood.”
Those qualities, from an ingredient produced by a genetically engineered yeast, have made the burger a darling among high-end restaurants like Momofuku Nishi in New York and Jardinière in San Francisco, and have attracted more than $250 million in investment for the company behind it, Impossible Foods.
Bill Gates is an investor.
That makes me want to run to my Mac.
The genetically engineered yeast thingy is just thrown in there to raise alarm.
My 1985 daily squash partner, Andy, was working on genetically engineered yeast for wine back in the day. Our bottling parties were legend.
Now, its secret sauce — soy leghemoglobin, a substance found in nature in the roots of soybean plants that the company makes in its laboratory — has raised regulatory questions.
Impossible Foods wants the Food and Drug Administration to confirm that the ingredient is safe to eat. But the agency has expressed concern that it has never been consumed by humans and may be an allergen, according to documents obtained under a Freedom of Information request by the ETC Group as well as other environmental and consumer organizations and shared with The New York Times.
“F.D.A. believes the arguments presented, individually and collectively, do not establish the safety of soy leghemoglobin for consumption,” agency officials wrote in a memo they prepared for a phone conversation with the company on Aug. 3, 2015, “nor do they point to a general recognition of safety.”
Impossible Foods can still sell its burger despite the F.D.A. findings, which did not conclude soy leghemoglobin was unsafe. The company plans to resubmit its petition to the agency.
Impossible Foods is finding out what happens when a fast-moving venture capital business runs headlong into the staid world of government regulation.
In the case of Impossible Foods, the debate centers on its use of soy leghemoglobin, which the company’s engineered yeast produces and forms an important ingredient behind the business.
The company was started in 2011 by Pat Brown, a chemist at Stanford University. His approach, involving genetics, microbiology and cutting-edge chemistry attracted venture capitalists also eager to find plant-and lab-based replacements for hamburgers and chicken wings.
Impossible Foods sought to woo top chefs with a splashy sales pitch about how the burger mimicked the aroma, attributes and taste of real beef. When soy leghemoglobin breaks down, it releases a protein known as heme, giving it that meatlike texture.
Within three years of its founding, Impossible Foods landed big-name investors like Khosla, Mr. Gates and the Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-Shing. This month, Temasek Holdings, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, joined an investment round that added $75 million to the company’s coffers.
“I love V.C.s and particularly the ones that invested in us,” Mr. Brown said at a TechCrunch conference in May, referring to venture capital firms. “But it’s truly astonishing how little diligence they do in terms of the actual science that underlies some tech companies.”
The F.D.A.’s approval is not required for new ingredients. Companies can hire consultants to run tests, and they have no obligation to inform the agency of their findings, a process known as self-affirmation.
Impossible Foods adhered to that procedure, concluding in 2014 that soy leghemoglobin was safe. But it went further, seeking the regulator’s imprimatur.
“We respect the role the F.D.A. plays in ensuring the safety of our food supply, and we believe the public wants and deserves transparency and access to any information they need to decide for themselves whether any food they might eat is safe and wholesome,” Rachel Konrad, a spokeswoman for Impossible Foods, wrote in an email.
The F.D.A., however, wanted the company to show the ingredient was safe specifically for humans. It told Impossible Foods to establish the safety of the more than 40 other proteins that make up part of its soy leghemoglobin. F.D.A. officials said the company’s assessment of the potential for the ingredient to be an allergen was deficient.
“This product has been touted as the ‘secret sauce’ in the Impossible Burger,” said Jim Thomas, program director at the ETC Group, the Canadian environmental organization that started the Freedom of Information request. “Now we know that the F.D.A. had questions about it, but it was put on the market anyway.”
Ms. Konrad defended the burger, writing it “is entirely safe to eat” and “fully compliant with all F.D.A. regulations.” She said the company was “taking extra steps to provide additional data to the F.D.A. beyond what’s required.”
Impossible Foods, she said, has tested its ingredient on rats fed “well above” the amount of soy leghemoglobin in its burger. Ms. Konrad said the company’s expert panel had determined those tests also demonstrated the ingredient was safe, and that the company would thus resubmit its petition for F.D.A. confirmation this month.
This is a novel food, and makes Canada’s approach to regulation of food safety sane, for a while.
Manure from ruminants is easily aerosolized in these environments, and I’ve been to many human-animal interaction events for research, and there is shit everywhere.
Although ostensibly designed to promote understanding of food production, these agricultural celebrations rarely discuss risk – until an outbreak happens.
The motto seems to be: It’d be better for us if you don’t understand.
Erdozain G, Kukanich K, Chapman B, Powell D. 2012. Observation of public health risk behaviours, risk communication and hand hygiene at Kansas and Missouri petting zoos – 2010-2011. Zoonoses Public Health. 2012 Jul 30. doi: 10.1111/j.1863-2378.2012.01531.x. [Epub ahead of print]
Observation of public health risk behaviors, risk communication and hand hygiene at Kansas and Missouri petting zoos – 2010-2011Outbreaks of human illness have been linked to visiting settings with animal contact throughout developed countries. This paper details an observational study of hand hygiene tool availability and recommendations; frequency of risky behavior; and, handwashing attempts by visitors in Kansas (9) and Missouri (4), U.S., petting zoos. Handwashing signs and hand hygiene stations were available at the exit of animal-contact areas in 10/13 and 8/13 petting zoos respectively. Risky behaviors were observed being performed at all petting zoos by at least one visitor. Frequently observed behaviors were: children (10/13 petting zoos) and adults (9/13 petting zoos) touching hands to face within animal-contact areas; animals licking children’s and adults’ hands (7/13 and 4/13 petting zoos, respectively); and children and adults drinking within animal-contact areas (5/13 petting zoos each). Of 574 visitors observed for hand hygiene when exiting animal-contact areas, 37% (n=214) of individuals attempted some type of hand hygiene, with male adults, female adults, and children attempting at similar rates (32%, 40%, and 37% respectively). Visitors were 4.8x more likely to wash their hands when a staff member was present within or at the exit to the animal-contact area (136/231, 59%) than when no staff member was present (78/343, 23%; p<0.001, OR=4.863, 95% C.I.=3.380-6.998). Visitors at zoos with a fence as a partial barrier to human-animal contact were 2.3x more likely to wash their hands (188/460, 40.9%) than visitors allowed to enter the animals’ yard for contact (26/114, 22.8%; p<0.001, OR= 2.339, 95% CI= 1.454-3.763). Inconsistencies existed in tool availability, signage, and supervision of animal-contact. Risk communication was poor, with few petting zoos outlining risks associated with animal-contact, or providing recommendations for precautions to be taken to reduce these risks.
Best practices for planning events encouraging human-animal interactions
Zoonoses and Public Health
G. Erdozain , K. KuKanich , B. Chapman and D. Powell
Educational events encouraging human–animal interaction include the risk of zoonotic disease transmission. It is estimated that 14% of all disease in the US caused by Campylobacter spp., Cryptosporidium spp., Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) O157, non-O157 STECs, Listeria monocytogenes, nontyphoidal Salmonella enterica and Yersinia enterocolitica were attributable to animal contact. This article reviews best practices for organizing events where human–animal interactions are encouraged, with the objective of lowering the risk of zoonotic disease transmission.
In the UK each year roughly 20,000 people are hospitalised with food poisoning and 500 people die. Symptoms are unpleasant and include vomiting, diarrhoea and a high temperature, according to the NHS. There are a number of causes, including chemicals, toxins and bacteria. While it’s almost always an accident, food poisoning tends to affect people after they’ve eaten particular foods. According to the Australian Institute of Food Safety, this is because certain foods are more at risk of bacterial growth than others. Poultry Raw and undercooked poultry can be contaminated with campylobacter bacteria and salmonella. According to the Australian Institute of Food Safety, the bacteria can survive up until cooking kills them – so make sure you cook it thoroughly and don’t contaminate surfaces with raw chicken.
Cook poultry to an internal temperature of 74C (165F) to ensure safety, forget the jargon “cook thoroughly,”doesn’t tell me anything.
Eggs Last week it was revealed that Dutch eggs contaminated with insecticide may have entered the UK. They can also sometimes be contaminated with salmonella. You can avoid being affected by cooking eggs thoroughly, and avoiding foods that purposely contain undercooked eggs, like mayonnaises and salad dressings, according to the Australian Institute of Food Safety.
Leafy greens Because they are often eaten raw with no cooking process, bacteria like E.coli can easily affect you. However, according to the Australian Institute of Food Safety, washing them can reduce risk of harmful bacteria as well as chemical pesticides.
Well this all depends if the salad is pre-washed and labelled accordingly, if so, washing lettuce at home will only increase the risk of cross-contamination. Reducing the food safety risk with leafy greens begins well before it arrives in your home.
Raw milk This is where milk is unpasteurised, meaning it has not been heated up to kill harmful bacteria. It leaves you at a higher risk than regular milk of consuming bacteria like E.coli, salmonella and listeria.
Raw milk has always left an impression on me ever since I was a food tech in Alberta. The health department submitted a sample of raw milk from a community in Alberta where a significant number of kids became ill. I was responsible in analyzing the milk to determine the etiologic agent and I remember vividly looking at this black, overgrown agar plate, completely taken over by Campylobacter jejuni, poor kids.
Cheese A bacteria commonly found in cheese is staphylococcus aureus. It’s heat resistant, so the best way of avoiding cheese becoming contaminated is to store it at or under 5 degrees.
The general public didn’t have access to the suspect food, so there was no point in unnecessarily alarming the public.
I’ve heard that paternalistic crap for 30 years now, and it never turns out well.
Coral Beach of Food Safety News reports that Virginia officials did not alert the general public to an E. coli outbreak in March 2016 that sickened at least 14 people — a dozen of them children.
This week, 17 months after the outbreak, public health officials expect to complete their report on the incident, according to a spokesman for the Virginia Department of Health. The implicated milk was from Golden Valley Guernseys (free samples delivered for $4) dairy, which sent a letter to members of its herd-share operation alerting them to the illnesses at the time.
Of the 14 confirmed E. coli victims, half had symptoms so severe that they required hospitalization. Three developed hemolytic uremic syndrome.
The state health department’s Rappahannock-Rapidan Health District office did not make a public announcement about the outbreak at the time because the general public did not have access to the milk, District Director Dr. Wade Kartchner told Food Safety News.
“Consideration was given to putting out a broad public notice, but the nature of the herd-share programs are such that we were confident that we would be able to effectively reach those who were truly at risk of illness,” Kartchner said. “… it is not quite the same situation as a restaurant outbreak where the public at large may be exposed.”
This is so wrong.
Others, even mere mortals, learn from outbreaks: How did this happen? How dangerous was the outbreak? And what kind of foods to avoid, like raw fucking milk.
In the absence of public announcements, it also makes it harder for mere scientists to make a case that a certain food may be risky.
Going public is the new normal for foodborne outbreaks, and some day, admin-types may catch up.
Facebook, tweets, calls to lawyers like Marler, going public is any agency’s best defense.
And it’s the right thing to do.
We’ve published about this before, and as I said at the time, I’ve had different versions of this paper running through my head for 25 years.
It started as a rebel-without-a-clue teenager, and led to questions about mad cow disease in 1995 (or earlier) when the UK government knew there were human victims but said nothing until March 1996.
Yet the job of public health, no matter how many political assholes, no matter how many impediments, and no matter how many dog bites you have to investigate, is to protect public health.
If people are barfing, it’s time to go public.
That doesn’t always happen.
Anyone can search barfblog.com under the phrase “going public” and find hundreds of incidents of people acting like shits.
But this is important shit, because credibility depends on transparency and trust and truthiness (at least in my idyllic world-view).
Public health is under siege.
The science is there, the outbreaks are there. Go public.
Or at least explain the process so the rest of us can understand.
Going public: Early disclosure of food risks for the benefit of public health
Mar.17
NEHA, Volume 79.7, Pages 8-14
Benjamin Chapman, Maria Sol Erdozaim, Douglas Powell
Often during an outbreak of foodborne illness, there are health officials who have data indicating that there is a risk prior to notifying the public. During the lag period between the first public health signal and some release of public information, there are decision makers who are weighing evidence with the impacts of going public.
Multiple agencies and analysts have lamented that there is not a common playbook or decision tree for how public health agencies determine what information to release and when. Regularly, health authorities suggest that how and when public information is released is evaluated on a case-by-case basis without sharing the steps and criteria used to make decisions. Information provision on its own is not enough.
Risk communication, to be effective and grounded in behavior theory, should provide control measure options for risk management decisions.
There is no indication in the literature that consumers benefit from paternalistic protection decisions to guard against information overload. A review of the risk communication literature related to outbreaks, as well as case studies of actual incidents, are explored and a blueprint for health authorities to follow is provided.
One of the trendiest drinks of 2017 is the Moscow Mule: a refreshing mix of vodka, ginger beer and lime juice. Much of the cocktail’s appeal is down to the fact it’s often served in very Instagram-friendly copper-coloured mugs. But now a US state department has issued a warning that these pretty vessels could give you food poisoning if they have not been specially made for cocktails. The stark message comes from the state of Iowa’s Alcoholic Beverages Division, which has warned that copper and copper alloys are poisonous if consumed. When these metals come into contact with food or drink with a pH level lower than 6, copper may leak into the edible substance and can be accidentally consumed. The warning states: ‘High concentrations of copper are poisonous and have caused foodborne illness.’ The pH level of a Moscow Mule is well below 6, which is why Iowa and several other states have issued the warning as these cocktails are often served in copper mugs.
Symptoms of copper food poisoning can occur immediately which includes nausea, vomiting (green), diarrhea and can leave a metallic taste in the mouth.
Never a good idea to dispense high acid foods with anything copper but that drink sounds good.
Non O157 STECs aren’t new but it’s still kinda notable when they pop up in recalls. The more folks look, whether buyers or suppliers are testing for them, the more folks find.
In 2015 E. coli O26 caused 60 illnesses (including 22 hospitalizations) associated with Chipotle. No source was identified, but the pathogen has been seen in both meats and produce. Today’s winner is cut broccoli.
Gold Coast has a food safety page on their website. They say stuff like, ‘Microbiological Testing Program – Our new, fully equipped, in-house Microbiological Laboratory performs raw product, in process, finished product, and environmental testing.’
and
‘All raw and finished products are “lot coded” and can be traced back to specific suppliers, growers, ranches, fields, and plots.’
Friend of barfblog, and frequent contributor (and modeler extraordinaire), Don Schaffner writes,
I’m always interested in the way microbiology is perceived in the popular culture. When peer reviewed research articles get wide pick up, I’m especially interested. This happened recently with an article on kitchen sponges. Rob Mancini has already blogged about this right here on barfblog, but I’d like to share my thoughts and perspectives.
The fact the kitchen sponges can be massively contaminated by high levels of microorganisms is not news. This has been shown repeatedly in the peer reviewed literature.
What was apparently new in this latest article was the application of “454–pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA genes and fluorescence in situ hybridization coupled with confocal laser scanning microscopy (FISH–CLSM)”. And I get it. Molecular-based methods are all the rage, and the ability to visualize the presence of microorganisms is very important.
But we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that experimental design, and proper experimental controls are important no matter what sort of science you’re doing. When I dug a little deeper into the above article I was shocked to learn that all of their conclusions were based on a sample of 14 sponges. That’s right, 14 sponges. Furthermore, the authors make claims that “sponge sanitation methods appear not sufficient to efectively reduce the bacterial load in kitchen sponges”. How did they know this? Well when they were collecting those 14 sponges they asked the sponge owners “to specify whether they regularly apply special measures to clean their sponge. The procedures mentioned were: heating in a microwave and rinsing with hot, soapy water”. Of the 14 sponges collected, in five cases the sponge owners reported applying special measures, although the authors do not which of the five used microwaving and which used rinsing with hot, soapy water.
What’s my take away message from this? By all means, go out there and use the hot new technology. But please don’t forget that sample size is very important, and while surveying people for their opinion about what they do might be convenient, it’s no substitute for actually investigating. And if I had to predict the effect of washing sponges with hot soapy water? Probably no different than washing in cold soapy water.
And if anybody out there has access to “454–pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA genes and fluorescence in situ hybridization coupled with confocal laser scanning microscopy (FISH–CLSM)“ and wants to collaborate, I am available.
The Nevada County Public Health Department (NCPHD) has received reports of five young children with recent crampy abdominal pain and bloody diarrhea. Initial tests for three of the children have come back preliminarily positive for E. coli 0157:H7, which is the most commonly recognized Shiga-toxin-producing E. coli strain.
To date, no common food or animal exposure has been identified, but the Lake Wildwood Main Beach area has been a common recreational site among the cases.
NCEHD, in coordination with NCPHD and the Lake Wildwood Association, has temporarily closed the Main Beach access and swimming area associated with the Main Beach as a precaution to ensure public health and safety. Their staff collected water samples near the beach shoreline and the swim area. Test results received today show elevated fecal coliforms which are bacteria that can cause serious illness. For this reason, the Main Beach and swimming area will remain closed until levels fall. In addition, NCPHD and NCEHD advise no recreational swimming in the lake until additional beach areas have been tested. This is most critical for more vulnerable populations including young children, the elderly, pregnant women, and those with weakened immune systems.
Hannah Knowles of the Sacramento Bee reports authorities closed all of Lake Wildwood’s public beaches last week after water testing confirmed reports linking E. coli infections to the lake’s Main Beach, also called Commodore Park. The county also advised against any swimming in the lake.
