Incidence of campy in pets and petting zoos

Animal contact is a potential transmission route for campylobacteriosis, and both domestic household pet and petting zoo exposures have been identified as potential sources of exposure.

courtlynn.petting.zooResearch has typically focussed on the prevalence, concentration, and transmission of zoonoses from farm animals to humans, yet there are gaps in our understanding of these factors among animals in contact with the public who don’t live on or visit farms.

This study aims to quantify, through a systematic review and meta-analysis, the prevalence and concentration of Campylobacter carriage in household pets and petting zoo animals. Four databases were accessed for the systematic review (PubMed, CAB direct, ProQuest, and Web of Science) for papers published in English from 1992–2012, and studies were included if they examined the animal population of interest, assessed prevalence or concentration with fecal, hair coat, oral, or urine exposure routes (although only articles that examined fecal routes were found), and if the research was based in Canada, USA, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. Studies were reviewed for qualitative synthesis and meta-analysis by two reviewers, compiled into a database, and relevant studies were used to create a weighted mean prevalence value. There were insufficient data to run a meta-analysis of concentration values, a noted study limitation.

The mean prevalence of Campylobacter in petting zoo animals is 6.5% based on 7 studies, and in household pets the mean is 24.7% based on 34 studies. Our estimated concentration values were: 7.65x103cfu/g for petting zoo animals, and 2.9x105cfu/g for household pets. These results indicate that Campylobacter prevalence and concentration are lower in petting zoo animals compared with household pets and that both of these animal sources have a lower prevalence compared with farm animals that do not come into contact with the public.

There is a lack of studies on Campylobacter in petting zoos and/or fair animals in Canada and abroad. Within this literature, knowledge gaps were identified, and include: a lack of concentration data reported in the literature for Campylobacter spp. in animal feces, a distinction between ill and diarrheic pets in the reported studies, noted differences in shedding and concentrations for various subtypes of Campylobacter, and consistent reporting between studies.

 

A systematic review and meta-analysis of the Campylobacter spp. prevalence and concentration in household pets and petting zoo animals for use in exposure assessments

18.dec.15

PLoS ONE 10(12): e0144976

Pintar KDM, Christidis T, Thomas MK, Anderson M, Nesbitt A, Keithlin J, et al.

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0144976

 

Better surveillance or worserer food? Increasing foodborne infections in the EU in 2014

Human cases of campylobacteriosis and listeriosis continued to rise in the EU in 2014, showing an increasing trend since 2008.

bureaucrat.pink.flyod“It is worrying that Campylobacter and Listeria infections are still rising in the European Union,” Mike Catchpole, Chief Scientist at ECDC said, “this situation highlights the importance of enhancing listeriosis surveillance through molecular typing, work currently developed by ECDC and EFSA, and strengthening the EU-wide Campylobacter control measures at EU-level”.

There were 2,161 confirmed cases of Listeriosis infections in 2014, a rise of 16% compared with 2013. Although the number of cases are relatively low, the rise of reported listeriosis cases is of particular concern as the surveillance of these infections is focused on severe forms of the disease, with higher death rates than for other foodborne diseases, particularly among the elderly, and patients with a weak immune system.

Campylobacteriosis remains the most commonly reported food-borne disease in the EU and has been so since 2005. The number of confirmed cases in the EU in 2014 was 236,851, an increase of 10%, compared with 2013. This increase can partly be explained by improvements in the surveillance system and/or improved diagnostics for campylobacteriosis in several Member States. In food, Campylobacter was mostly found in chicken meat.

Confirmed cases of salmonellosis, the second most commonly reported food-borne disease in the EU, increased slightly for the first time over the period 2008–2014, due to changes in the number of Member States reporting. However, there has been a statistically significant downward trend of salmonellosis in the seven-year period of 2008–2014. This is mainly due to the successful Salmonella control programmes put in place for poultry by EU Member States and the European Commission.

New US food safety meat measures

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service on Monday announced a new measure that will greatly improve the ability to trace cases of foodborne illness to their source.

paper.trailThe measure, which will require retailers to keep detailed records of the materials they use to make ground beef, was prompted in large part by events in Portland, Maine.

In 2011, a Salmonella outbreak resulted in several illnesses in Maine and parts of the Northeastern region of the U.S. The Food Safety and Inspection Service was able to trace the illnesses to Hannaford, a supermarket that, like many retailers, had used cuts of meat from various sources to make ground beef.

While the Food Safety and Inspection Service was able to trace the illnesses back to the supermarket that sold it, a lack of information about the source of the materials used to make the ground beef prevented us from going back further to the establishment that produced them. Doing so would have enabled us to ensure that the same unsafe meat was not being used by other retailers in the area.

This outbreak got the attention of Maine lawmakers, including U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins and then-U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe, all of whom pushed for changes to the recordkeeping requirements.

The USDA FSIS version is below:

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) today is publishing revised guidelines to assist poultry processors in controlling Salmonella and Campylobacter in raw food products and prevent cases of foodborne illness. This updated document is the fourth edition of the “FSIS Compliance Guideline for Controlling Salmonella and Campylobacter in Raw Poultry” and is intended to offer poultry companies best practices for minimizing pathogen levels and meeting FSIS’ food safety requirements.

“These guidelines take into account the latest science and practical considerations, including lessons learned from foodborne illness outbreaks in the last several years, to assist establishments in producing safer food,” said USDA Deputy Under Secretary for Food Safety Al Almanza. “This new guide is one piece of FSIS’ Salmonella Action Plan and our effort to reduce Salmonella illnesses attributed to meat and poultry products by 25 percent in order to meet the nation’s Healthy People 2020 goals. By following the newer guidelines, poultry facilities can help us reach this important public health target.” 

The new guide makes science-based suggestions for interventions that poultry companies can take on the farm (known as pre-harvest), sanitary dressing procedures, further processing practices, antimicrobial interventions, and other management practices. These prevention and control measures represent the best practice recommendations of FSIS based on scientific and practical considerations. This guidance is particularly important in light of Salmonella outbreaks involving poultry products.

FSIS is seeking comment on the guidelines, which were last updated in 2010. A downloadable version of the compliance guidance is available at: www.fsis.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsis/topics/regulatory-compliance/compliance-guides-index. The guidelines are also posted at the Federal eRulemaking Portal at: www.regulations.gov where comments can be submitted.

While rates of foodborne illness overall have fallen over the course of this century, Salmonella rates have remained relatively stagnant, prompting FSIS to take an all-hands on deck approach to addressing the pathogen in meat and poultry products. The guidance, along with development of new performance standards for raw chicken breasts, legs and wings as well as for ground and other comminuted chicken and turkey products unveiled in January, are a major step in FSIS’ Salmonella Action Plan. FSIS’ science-based risk assessment estimates that implementation of the new performance standards will lead to an average of 50,000 prevented illnesses annually.

Over the past six years, USDA has collaborated extensively with other federal partners to safeguard America’s food supply, prevent foodborne illnesses and improve consumers’ knowledge about the food they eat. USDA’s FSIS is working to strengthen federal food safety efforts and develop strategies that emphasize a three-dimensional approach to prevent foodborne illness: prioritizing prevention; strengthening surveillance and enforcement; and improving response and recovery.

Food safety is not simple, so stop saying it

It’s not simple.

Food safety is not simple.

food-safety-1But wanker organizations and bureaucrats around the world insist it is.

No.

Food safety is not simple.

Food Standards Scotland (FSS) has launched its festive food safety campaign, urging Christmas cooks to follow simple food safety tips when preparing meals.

The campaign uses tongue-in-cheek humour to get the food safety message across, featuring Santa Claus stricken by a bout of food poisoning. 

Geoff Ogle said there are number of simple things that people could do to help reduce food poisoning infections. He added: “These should include allowing adequate time to defrost your turkey in the bottom of your fridge or somewhere cold: large turkeys can take a couple of days. If it’s not completely de-frosted it can mean inconsistent cooking through the bird and won’t get rid of bugs like campylobacter which can cause food poisoning.

“Also make sure it’s cooked through until the juices run clear, store leftovers in the fridge and eat them within two days unless they’ve been frozen, and re-heat them just once. And keep your fridge temperature at 0-5°C.”

Use a thermometer. Juices running clear is terrible advice.

But food safety is simple.

And if you get sick, it’s your fault.

30 sick with Campy at private school in New Jersey

The Warren County Health Department has confirmed the presence of several Campylobacter infections at Blair Academy, a private high school in Blairstown, where about 80 per cent of its 460 students board at the school.

blair.academy.njPeter Summers, Warren County health officer, said that “a few” of the tests that were sent out to labs came back positive for campylobacter after approximately 30 people had reported becoming ill since mid-November.

Officials at Blair Academy could not be reached for comment, but Summers said he believed parents of students were notified of the infection within the last week or so.

Not the headline Batz would have used: Which U.S. foods are most likely to get you sick

Friend of the barfblog.com Michael Batz, says there is a difference between “which foods are most likely to get you sick?” and “which foods cause the greatest burden in the U.S.?”

So he provided commentary on a story he helped create.

The story ran in Fortune, and claimed the U.S. economy will take a $15.5 billion dollar food safety hit through lost income, lost revenue, healthcare-related costs and some intangibles, like “pain and suffering,” according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Research shows the most common foodborne pathogen is norovirus, which is the leading cause of gastroenteritis. The most deadly is listeria; though it is rare, with just 123 confirmed cases in 2013, 24 led to death. The most expensive is salmonella, which is quite common — 7,277 cases in 2013, but with a small fraction (127) resulting in death.

How worried should Americans be about the safety of the food supply? Which foods are most likely to get Americans sick? A deep dive into the data offers a look at where the risks lie.

To identify the most dangerous foods, the Emerging Pathogen Institute, a research institute at the University of Florida, compiled a greatest hits of dangerous pathogen/food pairings. Using a methodology that combined the likelihood of contracting an illness and the illness’s severity to calculate total disease burden, the group identified a Top Ten list of combinations.

Rank Food and Pathogen Cost Illnesses Hospitalizations Deaths
1 Poultry (campylobacter) $1,257m 608,231 6,091 55
2 Pork (toxoplasma) $1,219M 35,537 1,815 134
3 Deli meats (listeria) $1,086M 651 595 104
4 Poultry (salmonella) $712M 221,045 4,159 81
5 Dairy products (listeria) $724M 434 397 70
6 Complex Foods (salmonella) $630M 195,655 3,682 72
6 Complex foods (norovirus) $914M 2,494,222 6,696 68
8 Produce (salmonella) $548M 170,264 3,204 63
8 Beef (toxoplasma) $689M 20,086 1,026 76
10 Eggs (salmonella) $370M 115,003 2,164 42

 The top pairings don’t necessarily map to the major outbreaks of disease; only four of the top ten outbreaks in 2014 were from pairings on the list. J. Glenn Morris, director of the Emerging Pathogen Institute, told Fortune that, outbreaks are “a small fraction” of the total number of foodborne illnesses. In most cases, foodborne illnesses are limited to a small group of people, which makes it difficult for authorities to track.

cdc.fbi.illnessBatz explains the which-foods-cause-the-greatest-burden-in-the-U.S. is about everyone. It is the summary row in a table with 300 million lines, each row representing a different person. Each row could be considered something like individual risk.

(You think you’re a special snowflake? Nope, you’re just a row in the giant spreadsheet of life.)

Our individual risks differ so greatly. Unless you’re pregnant, you don’t need to worry about transmitting Listeria monocytogenes or Toxoplasma gondii to your fetus. Your risks go up when you’re immunocompromised, particularly for some bugs. The young and old face increased risks, though again, every disease is different. People of different ages and genders have different food consumption patterns, too.

And even then, that one row represents risks faced at every meal over the course of a year. Some foods have much higher risks per serving, yet we don’t eat them that often. We consume other foods with lower risks per serving in very high quantities. When you’re telling someone which foods are riskiest, which do you mean? It’s tricky.

Five or so years ago, my colleagues and I published the results of trying to just get at that summary row. Or to be more specific, we tried to say something about which pathogens, which foods, and which pathogen-food pairs cause the greatest public health impact. This kind of information is, I believe, important for getting a handle on the landscape of foodborne disease, to help guide our efforts to reduce the burden.

fbi.batz.pie.chart.nov.15The report had a punchy “top ten” type title and got some attention (for which I’m thankful). But the attention has always come with a price, and that price is that when work like this is written up, it’s almost always presented to readers as some version of which foods to avoid.

I get it, I really do. It’s natural to frame things to readers this way, to take research and make it personally relevant to them. But it kind of butchers the work, and can do as much to misinform as to educate.

So kudos to Tamar Haspal of Fortune for mostly getting it right in an article that presents risks at the broad, national level. Boo to whoever wrote the headline, which conflates population and individual risk and asks “which foods are most likely to make you sick?”

Translating research is always tricky, and I’m never quoted quite to my satisfaction (I can’t get none). In the article, I say we value mortality at $8.7 million per life lost because “there’s also a social welfare value to a life.” Well, that’s not quite right, and I’m doubtful I put it quite that way, and my economist friends are likely groaning at the phrasing, but it’s fine. It’s mostly right, anyway. You have to learn to turn the other cheek.

But other things I just can’t let go. Like the fact that, for the record, I hate pie charts.

PR 101: Campylobacter still present on 76% of UK birds, but heavy contamination is down! Steaming hot sucks

The results for the first quarter of testing, from July to September 2015, show a decrease in the number of birds with the highest level of contamination from the same months last year.

chickenpurseThese most heavily contaminated birds are the focus of the current target agreed by industry, which is equivalent to no more than 7% of chickens at retail having the highest levels of contamination. Research has shown that reducing the proportion of birds in this category will have the biggest positive impact on public health.

The new data shows 15% of chickens tested positive for the highest level of contamination, down from 22% in July to September 2014. Campylobacter was present on 76% of chicken samples, down from 83% in the same months of last year.

The results for the first quarter show:

15% of chickens tested positive for campylobacter within the highest band of contamination*

76% of chickens tested positive for the presence of campylobacter

0.3% of packaging tested positive at the highest band of contamination

6% of packaging tested positive for the presence of campylobacter

*More than 1,000 colony forming units per gram (cfu/g). These units indicate the degree of contamination on each sample.

In this first quarter, 1,032 samples of fresh whole chilled UK-produced chickens and packaging have been tested. The chickens were bought from large UK retail outlets and smaller independent stores and butchers. The new survey commenced sampling in July 2015.

The FSA has been testing chickens for campylobacter since February 2014 and publishing the results as part of its campaign to bring together the whole food chain to tackle the problem. Campylobacter is the most common cause of food poisoning in the UK, making an estimated 280,000 people ill every year.

As with the previous survey, the data shows variations between the retailers. Testing of chickens from Co-op and Waitrose show both retailers have made the most significant reductions in the proportion of the chickens they sell that are most highly-contaminated.

Steve Wearne, Director of Policy at the FSA said: ‘It is good to see that some retailers are getting to grips with campylobacter. However, we want to see all of them pulling together to achieve real and lasting reductions.

‘I am also pleased that we are starting to see retailers and processors being open with consumers about what they are doing to tackle the problem and about the impact their interventions are having on the chickens they are selling.’

But FSA continues to insist chicken is safe as long as consumers follow good kitchen practice:

chicken.thermCover and chill raw chicken: Cover raw chicken and store on the bottom shelf of the fridge so juices cannot drip on to other foods and contaminate them with food poisoning bacteria such as campylobacter;

Don’t wash raw chicken: Cooking will kill any bacteria present, including campylobacter, while washing chicken can spread germs by splashing;

Wash hands and used utensils:  Thoroughly wash and clean all utensils, chopping boards and surfaces used to prepare raw chicken. Wash hands thoroughly with soap and warm water, after handling raw chicken. This helps stop the spread of campylobacter by avoiding cross contamination.

Cook chicken thoroughly:  Make sure chicken is steaming hot all the way through before serving. Cut in to the thickest part of the meat and check that it is steaming hot with no pink meat and that the juices run clear.

Steaming hot sucks, especially for a science-based agency.

 

Cook with thermometers: Campy in UK supermarkets, oh and surveys suck

The Food Standards Agency is Thursday to publish the results of its latest UK supermarket survey, testing for the deadly bug Campylobacter in chickens on sale.

chicken.thermdsA study led by Professor Dan Rigby at The University of Manchester found that almost three-quarters of consumers still do not associate the pathogen – the most common cause of food poisoning – with the chickens that they buy.

Professor Rigby said: “Following the headlines – one year ago – about the amount of contaminated chicken on supermarket shelves, we surveyed 900 people and found that only 28% associated Campylobacter with poultry and most still significantly underestimated the rate of contamination of chickens for sale in the UK .

“These findings show there is still a huge amount of work to be done to reduce the problem of Campylobacter infection; a problem which costs the UK around £900m annually.”

“There is still a huge amount of work to be done to reduce the problem of Campylobacter infection; a problem which costs the UK around £900m annually -Professor Dan Rigby”

Other key findings include:

One third of people interviewed shortly after last year’s headlines said they could not recall the story.

Less than half [40%] said they would change their behaviour at all as a result of the news, most citing changes to the way they handled or cooked chicken.

Just over a third of the sample correctly identified the retailer which had just been revealed as having the highest contamination rate.

Retailers are failing to promote the food safety benefits of ‘roast in the bag’ chickens.

Public health types have better things to do: 8 sick from raw milk in Idaho

Idaho Public Health officials are investigating eight illnesses in southwest Idaho likely associated with drinking unpasteurized (raw) milk.

napoleon.raw.milkTo date, four Campylobacter and four E.coli O157:H7 cases have reported drinking raw milk produced by the Natural Farm Fresh Dairy of Kuna in the week prior to getting sick. The investigation is ongoing with Southwest and Central District Health departments, working in association with the Idaho State Department of Agriculture.

“If people have recently purchased raw milk from this dairy, we advise them not to drink it and to discard it,” says Dr. Leslie Tengelsen, State Public Health Veterinarian with the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare.

The Idaho State Department of Agriculture is working with Natural Farm Fresh Dairy to confirm if the raw milk from that facility was the source of the reported illnesses. The dairy is fully cooperating with the investigation and issued the following statement: “Natural Farm Fresh is committed to providing a safe and wholesome product to its customers. Effective immediately, we are voluntarily removing all raw milk products currently on the shelves in retail stores and we will discontinue further distribution of our raw milk until additional product testing is completed.”

Campy in raw organic milk in Calif.

The California Food and Drug Administration has ordered a state-wide recall of raw milk produced by milk Organic Pastures Dairy of Fresno.

colbert.raw.milkThat recall follows a quarantine order after Campylobacter was discovered in some of the company’s milk. The CDFA reported on Friday that no illnesses have been reported from people drinking the affected milk.

Under the recall order, Organic Pastures Dairy’s grade-A, raw milk with a code date of “OCT 24” on the containers must be pulled from store helves, and consumers are urged to dispose of any of this milk remaining in their refrigerators.

The bacteria was discovered during normal testing by the CDFA of the company’s milk, the agency reports.