Tag Archives: Minnesota

At least 6 sick; salmonella linked to organic eggs
 in Minnesota

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The Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) and the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) are investigating illnesses in at least six people in Minnesota that are connected with a recall of organic shell eggs due to contamination with Salmonella Enteritidis. The contaminated eggs were traced back by the MDA to Larry Schultz Organic Farm of Owatonna, where environmental testing confirmed the presence of Salmonella Enteritidis. Larry Schultz Organic Farm is cooperating with the MDA investigation and has issued a voluntary recall of the products.

Routine reportable disease monitoring by state health officials identified six cases of Salmonella Enteritidis infection with the same DNA fingerprint. The individuals became ill between August 12 and September 24. The illnesses occurred in both children and adults, and all are residents of the seven-county metropolitan area. Three of the cases were hospitalized but have since recovered. Five of the six cases have reported eating eggs from the Larry Schultz Organic Farm purchased at grocery stores or co-ops.

Eggs affected by this recall were distributed to restaurants, grocery stores, food wholesalers and foodservice companies in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan.

Eggs from Larry Schultz Organic Farm are packaged under the following brand names: Lunds & Byerlys Organic, Kowalski’s Organic, and Larry Schultz Organic Farm. Eggs are packed in bulk and varying sizes of cartons (6-egg cartons, dozen egg cartons, 18-egg cartons). Full product descriptions and a list of grocery stores where these products were sold can be found at www.mda.state.mn.us. Cartons bearing Plant Number 0630 or a “Sell by” date are not included in this recall.

Filbert: E. coli O157:H7 outbreak linked to in-shell hazelnuts

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This just in: a multi-state investigation has linked E. coli O157:H7 cases to eating in-shell hazelnuts, also known as filberts.

Someone will probably blame consumers.

The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) and the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) are working with counterparts in Wisconsin, Michigan, and federal agencies to investigate cases of E. coli O157:H7 infection associated with eating in-shell hazelnuts (also known as filberts) purchased from bulk bins at retail food stores. Three cases have been identified in Minnesota, three in Wisconsin, and one in Michigan.

In Minnesota, all three cases were male and over 50 years of age. Cases were residents of Hennepin, Redwood, and Stearns counties. Two were hospitalized. All have recovered.

Routine monitoring by the health departments in the respective states identified E. coli O157:H7 cases with the same DNA fingerprint. The individuals became ill between December 20, 2010, and January 28, 2011. All of the cases have reported eating in-shell hazelnuts from grocery stores. Of these, six purchased them from bulk bins at these stores and the other case reported purchasing similar product in a repacked form. Four of the cases reported purchasing the hazelnuts as part of mixed nuts.

Agriculture agencies in the three states and the California Department of Public Health traced hazelnuts consumed by cases to a common distributor in California, DeFranco and Sons. This firm has recalled all hazelnut and mixed nut products distributed from November 2, 2010, to December 22, 2010. Recalled product was shipped to stores in Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin.

State and federal officials urge consumers not to eat any in-shell hazelnuts included in this recall. To identify whether hazelnuts that have been purchased are part of the recall, consumers in the states listed above are advised to go to the MDA website at www.mda.state.mn.us to access a list of stores that sold bulk affected in-shell hazelnuts, either alone or as part of a mixed nut product. Also included in the recall are Sunripe Hazelnuts, Sunripe Large Hazelnuts in 1-pound packages, and Sunripe Mixed Nuts in 2-pound. and 4-pound packages, all with a “Sell-By” date of 6/30/2011. Recalled products would have been purchased after November 2, 2010. Consumers with recalled hazelnuts still in their possession should discard them or return them to the store from which they were purchased. Out-of-shell hazelnuts and products containing hazelnuts as an ingredient have not been linked to any illnesses and are not affected by the recall.

7 more sickened after drinking raw milk in Minn

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Illnesses in seven more people have been tied by the Minnesota Department of Health to the consumption of raw milk from a farm in Sibley County.

The department said Thursday that three people were infected with campylobacter and four more with cryptosporidium.

The patients told Health Department investigators they had consumed raw milk.

The department says those that named a source named the Hartmann dairy farm near Gibbon.

The department say laboratory tests found the bacteria and the virus in most of the ill people was genetically identical to samples taken from the farm this summer.

Hartmann’s farm was implicated in an outbreak of E. coli infections in May and June.
 

Roaches are dead, but problems remain at St. Paul restaurant

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A popular St. Paul restaurant (that’s in Minnesota, in the U.S., dontchaknow?) is fighting to stay open no longer has live cockroaches in its kitchen, city inspectors have reported, but there are dead ones nearby, as well as other problems.

TwinCities.com reports that days after the owner of Kim Huoy Chor Asian Cuisine publicly pledged his University Avenue eatery was sparkling clean after two years of failing inspections, city inspectors found numerous problems remained, from food being left out for hours to "dozens of dead roaches in an unused hallway in the basement," according to an inspection report.

Last Wednesday, council member Dave Thune was the lone holdout on a city council that was short a couple members. He prevented his colleagues from closing the restaurant after city attorneys and inspectors reported that two years of violations at Kim Huoy Chor amounted to the worst chronic violation in the history of city food inspections. At least two patrons reported being sickened after eating at the restaurant at 1664 W. University Ave.

Since Taing assumed ownership two years ago, inspectors documented a "cockroach infestation" and persistent food safety violations that they said could lead to food poisoning.

Haze strikes Minn. raw-milk producer in court

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The StarTribune reports that farmer Mike Hartmann, who sold raw milk linked to an outbreak of illness caused by dangerous E. coli bacteria, repeatedly told government attorneys in court Wednesday that he couldn’t remember simple details about his dairy operation that is under a bitterly contested impoundment order.

Among the things he said he couldn’t remember were his home address and the address of his dairy farm and why he claimed in a dispute with the state nine years ago not to own the farm he now says he’s owned since 1974. He also said he forgot where he learned how to sterilize his milking equipment.

Hartmann has been at odds with the Minnesota Agriculture Department, which impounded several hundred tubs of milk, ice cream and other foods in June after an E. coli outbreak sickened eight people and sent some to the hospital.

Hartmann also shed little light on some sanitation issues. Hartmann said his cows’ udders were cleaned regularly to prevent infection. When Kimberly Middendorf, an assistant state attorney general, asked about photos showing blotches on the udders, he said he couldn’t be sure whether they were skin pigment, dirt or manure.

Asked about state food safety regulations, Hartmann said he considered many of them "arbitrary" rather than beneficial. He also said that, as a farmer selling products direct to consumers, he believed he was exempt from the state rules.
Middendorf said that while farmers are allowed to make some sales direct to consumers from their farms without a retail license, they aren’t exempt from any other safety regulations.

Beach barf: E. coli O157:H7 hospitalizes 3, closes beach in Bemidji, Minn.

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There’s a beach closed somewhere every summer day, usually because of high E. coli counts, often linked to some form of sewage. I don’t report on the closings although am sympathetic if it’s your beach.

But when the beach at Diamond Point Park in Bemidji, Minnesota, was closed Thursday, I paid attention, because three swimmers seem to have acquired not the fecal coliform, but the far more dangerous E. coli O157:H7.

The Minnesota Department of Health spokesman Doug Schultz said three people became ill July 12 and July 13 from E. coli, and health officials have now determined that the common link was that all three had visited the beach sometime from July 8-11, adding,

"We would be looking for other possibilities, like food sources. But the common link appeared to be just the fact that they were swimming."

Minnesota Public Radio News reported that all three of those who became ill from the E. coli O157:H7 were hospitalized, and one person developed a complication called hemolytic uremic syndrome, which can affect the kidneys and can be fatal.
 

Lost control of process, lousy training; Minnesota firm fined after listeria in peanut butter recall

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Mike Hughlett of the Star Tribune writes that Parkers Farm, a Coon Rapids food manufacturer, has been fined $1,900 for food safety lapses after an extensive recall of peanut butter, cheese and other products in January.

The recall from such stores as Cub, Rainbow, Wal-Mart, Sam’s Club, Whole Foods and Hy-Vee was prompted by tests that found listeria bacteria in finished Parkers Farm’s products. It led to a temporary shutdown of the company’s plant.

The Minnesota Department of Agriculture said Tuesday that Parkers Farm was cited for selling adulterated food.

The state also found that the firm lost control of its manufacturing process and failed to adequately train and supervise workers, said Michael Schommer, a department spokesman.

Parkers Farm also must reimburse the state $46,000 for lab testing connected to the recall.

No illnesses were reported at the time of the recall, which involved 12 products.

Three more E. coli cases linked to raw milk from Minnesota farm

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State health officials have identified three additional cases of E. coli O157:H7 illness in Minnesotans linked to consumption of raw milk or other dairy products from a dairy farm in Gibbon, Minnesota.

Since May 26, including the new cases, a total of eight E. coli O157:H7 cases in seven different homes have been linked to products from the Hartmann Dairy Farm.

Two of the newly identified cases occurred in school-aged children who consumed milk from the Hartmann Dairy Farm. Both cases had E. coli O157:H7 with the same DNA fingerprint as five earlier cases associated with dairy products from the Hartmann farm. The other newly reported case occurred in an infant living in the same household as one of the earlier five cases. The infant had a confirmed case of E. coli O157:H7, but no stool sample was available for genetic fingerprinting in the MDH lab.

Health officials said today that 28 environmental and animal samples obtained by the Minnesota Department of Health from the Hartmann farm have now tested positive for E. coli O157:H7. Twenty-six samples had the same DNA fingerprint as the outbreak strain of E. coli O157:H7. These additional positive samples include environmental samples from the dairy barn where the cows are milked. The DNA fingerprint is unique among the more than 3,000 isolates of E. coli 0157:H7 tested at the Minnesota Department of Health since 1993. This strain





of E. coli O157:H7 has not previously been found in Minnesota.

E. coli outbreak: Minn. farm says we didn’t do it, despite DNA test

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For some reason, foodborne illness outbreaks involving raw milk, or organic or some other small food category require exaggerated level of proof to be believed. Epidemiology doesn’t seem to count, neither does knowledge of microbiology.

There’s at least five people sick with E. coli O157:H7 linked to consuming raw milk from the Hartmann Dairy Farm in southern Minnesota.

Yesterday, the farm released a statement saying,

"As of today, there is no evidence of any harmful bacteria in any raw milk, cheese, meat or other product sampled from the Hartmann Farm. The State has engaged in a serious regulatory and potentially criminal action in a grossly negligent manner with total disregard for the defamatory content of their media campaign."

OK, Bart (below, left, exactly as shown).

Today, the Minnesota Department of Health answered some questions:

What evidence do you have that raw milk from the Hartmann farm caused the illnesses?

This investigation began like many other foodborne investigations: Someone becomes ill, sees their physician and the physician sends a stool specimen to a clinical laboratory. If that laboratory finds, or “isolates”, one of a number of illness-causing bacteria (eg., Salmonella, E. coli O157:H7), they send that bacterial isolate to the MDH Public Health Laboratory (PHL) for further testing. Each bacterial isolate is DNA fingerprinted by a technique called pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE).

During May 2010, E. coli O157:H7 isolates from 5 patients sent by separate clinical laboratories to the MDH PHL were found to all have the same DNA fingerprint by PFGE testing.

This particular DNA fingerprint type (which also can be called a “strain”) of E. coli O157:H7 had never been seen before in Minnesota. The fact that multiple patients all were infected with this new strain in such a tight timeframe indicates that there was a common source for the illnesses. In other words, the patients must have acquired their infection from the same source.

In any foodborne illness investigation, MDH epidemiologists interview patients about an extensive array of possible exposures. These interviewers use a standard questionnaire and interview technique. This includes asking questions about what the ill people ate, including meat, produce and other food items. It also includes questions about recreational water and drinking water, contact with animals, daycare attendance, and more.

In this outbreak, the ill people came from communities across Minnesota, and the only exposure the cases had in common was consumption of raw dairy products from the Hartmann farm. This connection, and the fact that the same strain of E. coli O157:H7 found in the ill people was found in several animals and from several environmental samples on the Hartmann farm, clearly indicates that the farm was the source of the E. coli O157:H7 that made the people ill.

What is the significance of finding E. coli O157 in the environmental samples from the farm?

The strain found on the farm matches the strain found in the cases of illness. Again, this is a strain that has never been seen before in Minnesota.
This tells us that the bacteria that sickened the people was on the Hartmann farm and since several of the people that became ill never visited the farm, their only potential source would have been food products from the farm.

Did you find the outbreak strain in dairy product from the cases’ homes or from the farm?

The outbreak strain of E. coli O157:H7 has not been found in product yet. However, product samples that were collected from the farm were obtained one week to several weeks after production of products that made people sick. Other strains of Shiga toxin-producing E. coli were found, indicating an ongoing problem with contamination.

The fact that the outbreak strain was not found in samples of product taken from the farm or homes does not mean it wasn’t in the product that sickened the individuals. In many cases, only particular batches of product may have been contaminated. The product from the contaminated batches may not be available for testing because it has already been consumed. Even if the contaminated batches are available for testing, the contamination may not be uniformly distributed throughout the product. It can be difficult to find the “needle in the haystack” when only small amounts of product are able to be used for a laboratory test. The fact that some pathogen was not found in a sample taken today does not mean it wasn’t there yesterday or a week ago, or won’t be there tomorrow. Also, since raw milk contains many types of bacteria it is a difficult process to isolate individual bacteria growths and find the disease-causing strains.

The outbreak strain of E. coli O157:H7 was found in the manure of some individual calves, sheep, and cattle pens. Of note, the calves were likely drinking the same milk as that consumed by the cases.

Standard public health practice does not require finding the illness strain of pathogen in either environmental or product samples in order to determine the source of an outbreak and before intervention to prevent further illness should be initiated. In fact, it is quite rare in foodborne investigations that food product is available for testing as it is often perishable or has been completely consumed by the time the outbreak is recognized. State health and agriculture officials often act on epidemiologic evidence to remove contaminated products from the marketplace and prevent additional illnesses. Indeed, to do nothing in the face of such compelling evidence would be irresponsible – regardless of the size or nature of operation implicated.

Are there more cases being investigated?

Yes, MDH has received additional reports of illness in several consumers of Hartmann dairy products that it is investigating.

Raw milk from Minnesota farm, sick people, linked by DNA testing

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Epidemiology is an imperfect science; but it’s better than astrology, especially when people are seriously barfing.

Producers of food, big and small, have all employed various lines over the years to say, the evidence doesn’t really prove a specific food made a bunch of people barf or kill them. Governments have done the same thing in protecting various food-producing industries. The widespread standard of proof in the form of DNA fingerprinting was just being contemplated when I graduated with a molecular biology and genetics degree in 1985, and was dependent on a couple of other technologies, especially polymerase chain reaction of PCR amplification of small amounts of DNA.

But occasionally, the food detectives catch a break, and can definitively link a food product with sick people.

This has happened in Minnesota.

Laboratory testing conducted by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) and the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) this week provided additional evidence that the Hartmann dairy farm, of rural Gibbon, was the source of a strain of E. coli O157:H7 bacteria that sickened at least five Minnesotans after they consumed raw, unpasteurized milk or other dairy products from the farm. MDH reported four cases of illness last week, and a fifth case has subsequently been confirmed in a young child who was not hospitalized.

MDH first discovered the outbreak through reports of E. coli O157:H7 illness from health care providers. The department conducted an investigation into the illnesses, which were scattered across the state, and found that the only thing the ill people had in common was consumption of dairy products from the Hartmann farm. This strong epidemiological link is now reinforced by the laboratory confirmation that the specific strain of E. coli O157:H7 found in the ill patients has also been found in multiple animals and at multiple sites on the Hartmann farm. This strain of E. coli has not previously been found in Minnesota. Furthermore, laboratory tests confirmed that cheese samples collected last week from the farm contained another form of Shiga toxin-producing E. coli, demonstrating that an ongoing pathway of contamination existed on the farm. …

In addition to the cases linked to the Hartmann farm, MDH is investigating several other illnesses with a connection to products from the farm. MDA has embargoed dairy products on the Hartmann farm, prohibiting movement or release of the products off the farm.

An updated table of raw-milk related outbreaks is available at ?http://bites.ksu.edu/rawmilk