If you yak on your cat, what’s the best way to clean it and avoid norovirus transmission?

Amy has covered what to do if a student pukes in class; Ben and Mayra have made up a groovy infosheet on cleaning procedures.

But what if you yak on your cat or dog?

Specifically, as Scott Weese asks at the Worms & Germs Blog, when he should be enjoying turkey in Guelph, how do you disinfect a cat?

Weese explains how a colleague’s wife once had norovirus and spewed on the family cat, and says, dogs and cats cannot become infected with norovirus. However, they could act as a source of infection is their coat was contaminated.

Weese figures a bath is the best way to go (not the oven, right) and that anyone bathing a heavily contaminated animal should wear a mask and gloves, change their clothes after, clean any contaminated surfaces with bleach or another disinfectant and wash their hands.

He also concludes that the easiest way to handle this is to avoid vomiting on pets.

New Food Safety Infosheet:Effects of E. coli O157:H7 linked to grilled burger leaves woman paralyzed

In Sunday’s New York Times, journalist Michael Moss profiled a 2007 outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 linked to ground beef. The tragic story focused on one of the victims, Stephanie Smith, a 22-year-old woman who was in a coma and paralyzed after acquiring the pathogen.

The video (which I can’t seem to embed, but it can be viewed on the Times site) was particularly impactful and shows some of the devastating consequences of foodborne illness.

That story is the focus for this week’s food safety infosheet

Food Safety Infosheet Highlights:
– Ground beef has been linked to at least 16 outbreaks since 2007.
– In 2009, this pathogen led to the recall of beef from nearly 3,000 grocers in 41 states.
– Cook all ground beef to 155°F for 15 seconds or 160°F for an instant kill.
– Clean and sanitize all surfaces (cutting boards, counters) where ground beef items were prepared.

The food safety infosheet can be downloaded here.

New Food Safety Infosheet:Over 70 children ill from E. coli O157:H7 in two separate petting zoo outbreaks

Petting zoos, farm visits and local fairs are all settings for pathogen risks, especially for kids. Scott Weese at wormsandgerms detailed some of the risks in action that he saw recently at an Ontario site. Media reports out of the UK suggest that in the wake of the recent farm visit-linked outbreak with over 60 children ill with E. coli O157, agritourism business is down. Another 13 kids are also ill in outbreak linked to the Pacific National Exhibition in Vancouver.

Handwashing can reduce the risk of E. coli O157, but signs and sinks do not make people wash their hands. Operators and volunteers need to be diligent in promoting the importance of handwashing as infection control with patrons and staff and compel folks with creative messages.

CDC has a publication that operators should check out on managing public-animal contact risks (scroll down to the bottom of the page). We’ve combined some of that information and added our barfblog flare to come up with this week’s food safety infosheet, which is downloadable here.

Food safety infosheets now available in French, Spanish and Portuguese

I’m OK at coaching hockey. Soccer, not so much.

Years ago, one of my girl’s needed a coach for a team, so I volunteered. One of the parents was from Portugal. By my third game he was screaming at me from the sidelines.

Translation sounds easy.

It’s not.

Everyone interprets stuff differently

But I’ve got some people, and hopefully the translation pics won’t continue to crash the main website, and we’ll see where it all goes.

French, Spanish and Portuguese. Check them out.
 

Fat Duck outbreak redux — food safety infosheet version

This week’s food safety infosheet, directed at foodservice staff is attached here. The infosheet focuses on an outbreak at Heston Blumenthal’s Fat Duck restaurant which happened earlier this year. While norovirus illnesses were initially linked to patrons who ate shell???sh, health authorities believe that ill staff members handling other food also contributed to the length and scope of the outbreak.

Michelin Stars don’t mean anything when it comes to food safety culture.

Download the Fat Duck food safety infosheet here.

French and Spanish food safety infosheets now available at bites.ksu.edu

Amy is a French professor.  Her influence on me has been profound – and has even involved some language awareness stuff.

That’s why we have don’t eat poop shirts in French, Chinese and Spanish.

You’d figure that getting stuff translated into other languages would be a breeze, since I have an in with the department. But to do it in real-time is a bit messy. The first time I tried to upload a French infosheet, last week, I crashed the entire bites.ksu.edu site.

Damn you, France.

We’ve been messing around but are reasonably confident we’ve got the people and technology in place to at least translate food safety infosheets on a weekly basis. The Spanish food safety infosheets are available at http://bites.ksu.edu/infosheets-sp, and the French food safety infosheets are available at http://bites.ksu.edu/infosheets-fr.

Is this picture too gross? Will you think about washing your hands? H1N1 edition

Those ubiquitous signs, “Employees Must Wash Hands” probably don’t have the desired effect. Jon Stewart says, they sure ain’t keeping the piss out of your Happy Meals.

Some people have told us images like the one below, are too graphic and will offend people. Maybe. I’m offended that people don’t wash their hands which can lead to other people barfing and spreading things like the H1N1 virus. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control seems to agree, and has called for new food safety messages using new media.

So with all those germ factories … I mean students … returning to the confined quarters of residence living, here’s some tips for not barfing:

• Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it.

• If you are sick with flu-like symptoms, stay home for at least 24 hours after your fever is gone. Keep away from others as much as possible.

• Wash your hands often especially after you cough or sneeze.  Alcohol-based hand cleaners are also effective, but are best used after proper handwashing.

Hepatitis A debacle in Illinois

Who knew what, when? A common theme in foodborne illness outbreak management is how was the essential information managed and responded to (whether it was knowledge of a contaminated product, linked illnesses or reporting an infected food handler). As more information trickles out about a food handler-linked Hepatitis A outbreak in Milan, Illinois it gets more confusing as to when the operator knew about the illness. Today a customer came forward and claims overhearing the discussion:

The woman says she was waiting in line to order at the McDonalds in Milan on June 25th, when she heard employee Cheryl Schram approach a manager behind the counter.
”She came out and she said Michelle, I was diagnosed with Hepatitis A”, said the woman who doesn’t want her name used. ”I was in there and I heard her say that”.
The customer says she knows what she heard that day. ”I swear on my mothers grave”.

This week’s food safety infosheet is all about the Hep A outbreak. Download it here.

New food safety infosheet — Harvey’s E. coli O157:H7 Outbreak Report Released

The newest food safety infosheet, a graphical one-page food safety-related story directed at food handlers is also now available at foodsafetyinfosheets.ksu.edu. Infosheets are created weekly and are posted in restaurants, retail stores, on farms and used in training throughout the world.

This week’s food safety infosheet focuses on a Fall 2008 E. coli O157:H7 outbreak inked to a Harvey’s restaurant in North Bay, Ontario, Canada.

Food safety infosheet highlights:
– Health authorities point to Spanish red  onions as most likley source of the outbreak
– Poor sanitation of onion dicer may have prolonged the outbreak
– Equipment should be fully disassembled to allow for cleaning and sanitizing of hard to reach areas
Food safety infosheets are created weekly and are posted in restaurants, retail stores, on farms and used in training throughout the world. If you have any infosheet topic requests, or photos, please contact Ben Chapman at benjamin_chapman@ncsu.edu
You can follow food safety infosheets stories and barfblog on twitter @benjaminchapman and @barfblog.

Click here to download a pdf of the food safety infosheet.

Fat Duck staff members worked while ill

UK celeb chef Heston Blumenthal’s restaurant, The Fat Duck, has now been linked to over 400 illnesses. Moleculargastrologest Blumenthal, who looks like the love child of Alton Brown and Mats Sundin, reportedly had up to 16 food handlers working with norovirus symptoms at the restaurant.  Not a great idea.

The reality of the food industry is that a sick day is a day without pay and can lead to less hours. This continues to be a problem, especially with norovirus as ill food handlers are often linked to large-scale outbreaks.

Below is a food safety infosheet dedicated to the Fat Duck outrbreak.  You can download the food safety infosheet here.