The company says its imported Chinese berries were recalled on health department advice despite a lack of proof from accredited laboratories of a link to the hepatitis A virus (HAV).
“At this point, we have not been provided any remaining consumer product to test from the 13 confirmed HAV cases to clinically verify there is indeed a link with the Nanna’s Mixed Berries,” managing director and chief executive Stephen Chaur said in a statement on Friday.
Mr Chaur said the company had rigorous testing that went beyond the Australian standards requirement that five per cent of imported fruit containers be tested.
“Patties Foods’ documented test regime is among the highest, testing 20 per cent of all the containers when they arrive in Australia,” he said.
But Mr Chaur said sample testing for microbial and viral markers had been increased to 100 per cent of imported frozen berries from all countries.
The company has checked quality control testing documents back to June 2014 and says they’re satisfied no biological indicators outside Australian guidelines have been detected.
My experiments in the 1980s involved tomato plants, Verticillium resistance, using a midwife to deliver our children, and saying no to the pertussis vaccine.
My ex-wife and I prided ourselves on our evidence-based approach to things, but as pertussis vaccine safety improved, so has my advice to the two oldest kids who have kids of their own: (or are about to): get vaccinated.
A couple of weeks after U.S. Senator Bozo declared that handwashing in food service places like Starbucks could be voluntary, I’ve contemplated that position and concluded sure: with a couple of conditions.
What I have always said is this: government inspections are a minimal standard but necessary to hucksters accountable. The best will always go above and beyond what is expected.
Consumers should seek out those who market microbial food safety and steer clear of hucksterism.
But retailers are reluctant to market food safety.
And it’s the retailers who are the burden in this food safety stuff: they preach but they don’t practice.
In addition to the personal tragedies, every outbreak raises questions about risk and personal choice.
It’s true that choice is a good thing. People make risk-benefit decisions daily by smoking, drinking, driving, and especially in Brisbane, cycling.
But information is hard to come by.
I went to a supermarket in Brisbane, after taking my daughter to school, and was shocked to find Nanna’s berries – those linked to a growing hepatitis A outbreak — on the frozen shelves.
I asked the woman at checkout, weren’t those berries recalled?
She said, only the mixed ones.
I said, the raspberries and blueberries you’re selling are coming from the same source.
She shrugged and said, not in the recall.
They were recalled the next day.
With at least 14 Australians now confirmed ill with hepatitis A from frozen berries apparently grown in China, the case presents a microcosm of intersecting interests of global food, vaccination fears, poor handwashing and xenophobia (which Australians are particularly good at; as John Oliver said, “Australia is one of the most comfortably racist places I’ve ever been in. They’ve really settled into their intolerance like an old resentful slipper”).
The complacency of Australian regulators is astounding when compared to other Western-style food safety agencies.
There was limited notice of the recall from state and federal food safety agencies until they all turned up for work on Monday: people eat seven days a week.
The company involved, Patties Foods in Bairnsdale in regional Victoria, repacks frozen berries grown who knows where (China and Chile in this case, apparently).
For those worried about Hepatitis A:
Get vaccinated. It’s been mandatory in Canada and several U.S. states for five years. It was mandatory for us to emigrate to Australia four years ago. It should be mandatory for locals. If I ran a restaurant, I’d want everyone to be vaccinated.
Wash your hands. Hepatitis A is one of the few foodborne diseases that is only spread human-to-human. And, like most foodborne illness, it’s fecal-oral. The typical U.S. scenario is a 20-something goes to Mexico or the Dominican for a friends wedding (and where hep A is endemic), comes back and is serving salad to a few thousand people at their part-time job. But it’s not just the person is positive: The same person also failed to adequately wash their hands after having a poop, and ended up making your lunch. And was not vaccinated.
Know your suppliers. I’ve talked with a lot of parents at my daughter’s school in the past few days and they are all concerned. But usually for the wrong reasons. It is incumbent on the supplier – and the retailers who market this crap – to provide safe food. They’re the ones who make money.
Food porn is everywhere, but microbiology involves some basics: that’s why there’s vaccines, that’s why milk is pasteurized; that’s why we don’t eat poop (and if we do, make sure it’s cooked).
That’s why I have a bunch of tip-sensitive digital thermometers for my daughter’s school.
If someone wants to promote public disclosure of handwashing compliance and is able to prove it, great.
Otherwise, you’re just a talker, not a doer.
Dr. Douglas Powell is a former professor of food safety at the University of Guelph in Canada and Kansas State University in the U.S., who shops, cooks and ferments from his home in Brisbane, Australia.
The Internet sorta works for some, in Australia, I guess.
It’s Saturday afternoon here and the company says it will publish adverts in the Monday papers? It really is 1978 here (for some).
The Department of Health is calling on the company to recall the product after three Victorian adults and one in New South Wales were diagnosed with the disease.
Customers this morning blasted the company for not issuing any advice on their web channels.
Some customers were frustrated after they saw a Valentine’s Day post on the Nannas Facebook page was quickly removed as news of the outbreak came to the fore.
Others posting on the Facebook page demanded a refund on any medical check-ups they might need to undergo.
One wrote: “You have nothing on your Facebook page and are still promoting the contaminated product on your website. This is completely unacceptable, negligent.”
Another said she was “unhappy” after she had eaten the mixed berries only yesterday and asked for “further information on the recall issued and how to go about refund and medical tests.”
And another said she found it “highly irresponsible” for a Valentine’s Day post to be added “but no post regarding the potential Hepatitis A risk.”
Have any of these 6-figure bureaucrats seen the numerous stories linking Hep-A to frozen berries that have been circulating for at least two years?
Stores are being advised and there will be advertisements in national newspapers on Monday.
That’s because the Internet sucks in Australia, so people still newspapers.
1978.
The berries came from China and Chile and were packed at Patties, a company based at Bairnsdale, in eastern Victoria.
The company has been contacted for comment.
Dr Rosemary Lester, the state’s chief health officer, said frozen berries had been implicated in past outbreaks of Hepatitis A.
“Hepatitis A virus infection is uncommon and normally associated with travel to countries affected by endemic Hepatitis A,” she said.
“The only common link between the cases is consumption of this product. There is no overseas travel or common restaurant exposure.
“Sampling of the product will be undertaken to identify the virus but it is difficult to find Hepatitis A virus, even in a contaminated batch.”
The berries have a two-year shelf life and any product purchased from October 2014 onwards should be thrown out.
In a seperate recall, a number of hospitals have been told to throw out a chocolate mousse product, found in routine tests, to contain listeria.
The mousse, which had a use-by date of February 14, 2015, was supplied to the Austin Hospital, St Vincent’s Private, St Vincent’s Mercy, Brunswick Private, the Royal Children’s Hospital, Ballarat Health Services, Caulfield Hospital, Sandringham Hospital, Frankston Hospital and Rosebud Hospital.
Confirmed cases (outbreak strain KF182323) have been reported in Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Norway, the Netherlands, Poland, Sweden and the United Kingdom (331 in total). HAV contamination was detected in frozen mixed berries (14 lots) and mixed berry cakes/pastries (2 lots) in Italy, France and Norway. In Ireland, the Netherlands and Sweden, analysis of food histories and questionnaires identified suspect berries and berry products consumed by confirmed cases. Tracing began with 38 lots/cases from Italy, Ireland and the Netherlands, an additional 5 lots/cases were added from France, Norway and Sweden in spring 2014. The tracing data were exchanged via the European Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed.
The final dataset comprises 6227 transactions among 1974 food operators. Bulgarian blackberries and Polish redcurrants were the most common ingredients in the traced lots/cases; however, Poland is the largest producer of redcurrants in Europe, and Bulgaria is a major exporter of frozen blackberries. No single point source of contamination linking all 43 lots/cases could be identified. HAV cases/lots in five countries could be linked to seven Polish freezing processors and/or to five frozen berry suppliers in Bulgaria.
This indicates that HAV contamination could be occurring at the freezing processor or in primary production of berries and therefore compliance with Good Hygiene Practice, Good Manufacturing Practice and Good Agricultural Practice is recommended for countries producing berries for freezing. It is possible that contaminated product related to this outbreak could still be circulating in the food chain. Hence, for the public health domain, enhanced surveillance, risk communication, vaccination and further research are recommended.
On July 19, Ireland said to boil frozen berries after 10 people were confirmed with the same strain of Hepatitis A linked to 448 illnesses in Italy.
According to the Irish Times, the outbreak of hepatitis A related to frozen berries has been monitored by the European Centre for Disease Control since January, and it issued an assessment report on July 10th asking other EU countries “to raise awareness of a possible increase” in hepatitis A cases. In the report, the centre referred to three Irish people infected, “between 30 and 40 years of age, residents in three different geographic regions with no known links to each other.”
The chief executive of the FSAI, Prof Alan Reilly, said the decision was taken to only issue a warning July 19 because of the jump in cases this week. “You have to make a judgment call on when to inform the public.”
The Italians – 448 sick — fingered mixed berries (redcurrant, blackberries, raspberries, blueberries) and a dealer that received consignments of berries from different countries (mix made in Italy, with raw material from Bulgaria, Canada, Poland, and Serbia).
The Nords – 103 sick fingered frozen strawberries as the likely cause but could not exclude other frozen berries. The origin of the berries is still being investigated.
The Americans – 151 sick — fingered a common shipment of pomegranate seeds from a company in Turkey, Goknur Foodstuffs Import Export Trading, and will detain shipments of pomegranate seeds from Goknur arriving into the U.S. Those pomegranate seeds were used by Townsend Farms to make the Townsend Farms and Harris Teeter Organic Antioxidant Blends and by Scenic Fruit Company to make the Woodstock Frozen Organic Pomegranate Kernels.
The srains of Hepatitis A in the Nordic and American outbreaks appear to be different from each other and from the Italian-Ireland outbreak.
On 20 June in Italy a shipment of Romanian blueberries was discovered to be contaminated with hepatitis A. “The responsible agency in Romania looked at the suppliers and then claimed that the blueberry export from Romania was completely in agreement with the European standard. The manager of one of these agencies was of the opinion that the contamination with hepatitis possibly had taken place in Italy.”
The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Friday approximately 30 cases have been reported.
CDC says the cases are “potentially associated” with Townsend Farms Organic Antioxidant Blend frozen berries purchased from Costco.
Attorney Bill Gaar, representing Townsend Farms of Fairview, Ore., says investigators appear to be focusing on imported pomegranate seed that’s in the product.
A Costco spokesman says the company has removed the product from stores and is contacting its members.
Health officials don’t yet know if the product was sold at other stores or markets. They do know that frozen berry blends are often used to make smoothies, frozen bar drinks and other types of desserts and drinks. One concern is that smaller businesses might have bought bulk frozen berries at Costco and then used them in other products.
According to the label, the berry blend contained pomegranate seeds and other produce from the US, Argentina, Chile, and Turkey.
The strain of hepatitis A in this outbreak is rarely seen in the United States, said CDC’s Lola Russell. It’s known to circulate in North African and the Middle East. The same type of hepatitis A was identified in a 2013 outbreak in Europe linked to frozen berries and another one in 2012 in Canada linked to a frozen berry blend with pomegranate seeds from Egypt, she said.
The berries involved in the European outbreak(s) are from Egypt and Morocco.
I may have some in my freezer. I love the berries, but never thought that in Australia, they’d be coming from wherever. So naïve, and I got a PhD in this stuff.
“We’re still a proudly Australian based. We’ve just got a bit bigger as more and more people realize that frozen fruit is just as nutritious, delicious and easy to use as fresh.
“All this keeps us busy sourcing what’s best in season, from around the world, only choosing fruit that’s bursting with Hepatitis A vitamins and flavour. Then we lovingly pack the fruits of others our labour, so you can enjoy it, all year round.”
The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment says the first people became ill on April 29 and the most recent on May 21. Five of these cases are Colorado residents. The number of cases in Colorado and in this outbreak may change, because on average it takes 30 days to become ill with hepatitis A after eating contaminated food.
Radio Sweden reports that 12 more cases of hepatitis A in Sweden are probably linked to the same strain of virus first discovered in Denmark which authorities believe is caused by frozen berries.
Fifty-six cases of hepatitis A have been reported in Sweden since December. Normally, there are five cases a year in the country.
The Swedish Institute for Communicable Disease Control (Smittskyddsinstitutet, SMI) warned that the berries may have been responsible for 22 cases of Hepatitis A in Sweden so far.
The usual contagion rate for the same timeframe is about five people in Sweden.
Experts from the institute advised berry lovers to take caution when consuming any berries bought in Sweden that were sold frozen.
“If you cook them for at least one minute then all the contagion will die or disappear,” Margareta Löfdahl, epidemiologist from the Institute, told the TT news agency.
The people infected in Sweden were infected with the same type of Hepatitis that 30 people in Denmark were diagnosed with recently, which has since been traced to frozen berries and strawberries in particular.
The company says its imported Chinese berries were recalled on health department advice despite a lack of proof from accredited laboratories of a link to the hepatitis A virus (HAV).
