Be careful.
Question everything.
Me and Michael Batz (right, pretty much as shown) will be sharing our food safety thoughts in a STOP webinar tonight from 8:30 — 9:30 p.m. EST.
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/846828774
After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.
A couple of my Canadian kids were visiting last week during their university spring break. They’re both in biology, so the fruit don’t fall far from the … nevermind.
We were at Target – always a popular outing because Target stores are only now becoming established in Canada – and got some M&M’s for Sorenne. She dropped one on the floor and then picked it up and ate it.
I shrugged.
This was terrible food safety behavior on my part but I can’t babysit all the time.
And from my perspective, the risk was low.
The N.Y. Times quotes Dr. Roy M. Gulick, chief of the division of infectious diseases at Weill Cornell Medical College, as saying,
“The five-second rule probably should become the zero-second rule. Eating dropped food poses a risk for ingestion of bacteria and subsequent gastrointestinal disease, and the time 
the food sits on the floor does not change the risk.”
In general, if there are bacteria on the floor, they will cling to the food nearly immediately on contact, Dr. Gulick said. Factors that influence the risk and the rate of bacterial transfer include the type of floor; the type of food; the type of bacteria; and how long the bacteria have been on the floor.
In a study published in 2006 in The Journal of Applied Microbiology, Clemson University researchers tested salmonella placed on wood, tile or carpet, and dropped bologna on the surfaces for 5, 30 or 60 seconds. With both wood and tile, more than 99 percent of the bacteria were transferred nearly immediately, and there was no difference by the time of contact. Carpet transferred a smaller number of bacteria, again with no difference by contact time. The amount transferred decreased over hours, but there were still thousands of the bacteria per square centimeter on the surfaces after 24 hours, and hundreds survived on the surfaces for as long as four weeks. As few as 10 salmonella bacteria can cause gastroenteritis.
If providing safe food is a priority, why do large outbreaks of foodborne illness keep happening? Incidents like 2010’s salmonella-in-eggs outbreak sickened more than 1,900 across the U.S. and led to the recall of 500 million eggs.
A new study by a Kansas State University professor and colleagues finds how the culture of food safety is practiced within an organization can be a significant risk factor in foodborne illness.
Doug Powell, associate professor of food safety at K-State, said how businesses and organizations operate above and beyond minimal food safety .jpg)
regulations and inspections, or their food safety culture, is often overlooked.
"You’d think making customers sick is bad for business, yet some firms go out of their way to ignore food safety," Powell said. "Some places are motivated by money and efficiencies. The amount of regulation, inspection and audits just doesn’t seem to matter. And those ‘Employees Must Wash Hands’ signs don’t really work."
Powell, along with Casey Jacob, a former K-State research assistant, and Ben Chapman, an assistant professor at North Carolina State University, examined three food safety failures: an E. coli O157:H7 outbreak in Wales in 2005 that sickened 157 and killed one; a listeria outbreak in Canada in 2008 that sickened 57 and killed 23; and a salmonella outbreak in the U.S. in 2009 linked to peanut paste that killed nine and sickened 691.
Their study "Enhancing Food Safety Culture to Reduce Rates of Foodborne Illness" is being published by the journal Food Control and is available in advance online at http://bit.ly/hDh9EE.
"Creating a culture of food safety requires application of the best science with the best management and communication systems," Chapman said. "Operators should know the risks associated with their products, how to manage them, and most important, how to communicate with and compel their staff to employ good practices — it’s a package deal."
According to the researchers, individuals focusing on food safety risks within an organization with a good food safety culture do the following:
* know the risks associated with the foods they handle and how those should be managed;
* dedicate resources to evaluate supplier practices;
* stay up-to-date on emerging food safety issues;
* foster a value system within the organization that focuses on avoiding illnesses;
* communicate compelling and relevant messages about risk reduction activities, and empower others to put them into practice;
* promote effective food safety systems before an incident occurs; and,
• don’t blame customers, including commercial buyers and consumers, when illnesses are linked to their products.
Source: Doug Powell, 785-317-0560, dpowell@k-state.edu
Snappy title, eh? But not bad for a peer-reviewed journal article in Food Control that was published on-line today ahead of print publication.
Almost two decades ago, E. coli O157:H7 killed four and sickened hundreds who ate hamburgers at the Jack-in-the-Box fast-food chain in the U.S. and propelled microbial food safety to the forefront of the public agenda. (1).jpg)
However, it remains a challenge to compel food producers, processors, distributors, retailers, foodservice outlets and home meal preparers to adopt scientifically validated safe food handling behaviors, especially in the absence of an outbreak.
Readers of barfblog.com will be familiar with the details surrounding the three case studies of failures in food safety culture documented in the paper: E. coli O157:H7 linked to John Tudor & Son in Wales in 2005; listeria linked to cold-cuts produced by Maple Leaf Foods of Canada in 2008; and salmonella linked to Peanut Corporation of America in 2009.
But anyone can be a critic, so we offer suggestions to enhance food safety culture, such as food safety storytelling through infosheets (Chapman, et al., 2010). And we end with my usual plea to actively promote food safety efforts, coupling a strong food safety culture with marketing to the world.
We conclude:
Creating a culture of food safety requires application of the best science with the best management and communication systems. It requires commitment by an organization’s leaders, middle managers and food handlers. It also must be supported and demonstrated by sharing information within the organization and with customers. The food safety failures of John Tudor & Sons, Maple Leaf Foods, Inc. and PCA are illustrative of an emerging recognition that the culture of food safety within an organization is a significant risk factor in foodborne illness (Griffith et al., 2010a; Yiannis, 2009).
Individuals focusing on food safety risks within an organization with a good food safety culture:
• know the risks associated with the foods they handle and how those should be managed;
• dedicate resources to evaluating supplier practices;
• stay up-to-date on emerging food safety issues;
• foster a value system within the organization that focuses on avoiding illnesses;
• communicate compelling and relevant messages regarding risk reduction activities and empower others to put them into practice;
• promote effective food safety systems before an incident occurs; and,
• do not blame customers (including commercial buyers and end consumers) when illnesses are linked to their products.
The best food producers, processors, retailers and restaurants should go above and beyond minimal government and auditor standards and sell food safety solutions directly to the public. The best organizations will use their own people to demand ingredients from the best suppliers; use a mixture of .jpg)
encouragement and enforcement to foster a food safety culture; and use technology to be transparent – whether it’s live webcams in the facility or real-time test results on the website – to help restore the shattered trust with the buying public.
I’ll add more as the paper becomes available, and if Chapman has anything witty to add (that takes time).
Enhancing food safety culture to reduce rates of foodborne illness
Douglas A. Powella, Casey J. Jacoba and Benjamin J. Chapmanb,
a Department of Diagnostic Medicine/Pathobiology, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506, USA
b Department of 4-H Youth Development and Family and Consumer Sciences North Carolina State University, Campus Box 7606, Raleigh, NC 27695-7606, USA
Received 2 August 2010;
revised 29 November 2010;
accepted 7 December 2010.
Available online 24 December 2010.
Abstract
A culture of food safety is built on a set of shared values that operators and their staff follow to produce and provide food in the safest manner. Maintaining a food safety culture means that operators and staff know the risks associated with the products or meals they produce, know why managing the risks is important, and effectively manage those risks in a (1)(1).jpg)
demonstrable way. In an organization with a good food safety culture, individuals are expected to enact practices that represent the shared value system and point out where others may fail. By using a variety of tools, consequences and incentives, businesses can demonstrate to their staff and customers that they are aware of current food safety issues, that they can learn from others’ mistakes, and that food safety is important within the organization. The three case studies presented in this paper demonstrate that creating a culture of food safety requires application of the best science with the best management and communication systems, including compelling, rapid, relevant, reliable and repeated food safety messages using multiple media.
Keywords: behavior change; foodborne illness; marketing; organizational culture; risk communication
I went to graduate school because the girl I was living with was a veterinary student who had another three years of schooling ahead, so I 
thought I needed a reason to hang around.
That’s not a good reason to go to graduate school.
I married the girl and had kids but dropped out of grad school.
Distance education may have helped.
The World Health Organization estimates that up to 30 per cent of people in developed countries get sick from the food and water they consume each year and has identified five factors of food handling that contribute to these illnesses: improper cooking procedures; temperature abuse during storage; lack of hygiene and sanitation by food handlers; cross-contamination between raw and fresh ready to eat foods; and acquiring food from unsafe sources.
Food Safety Risk Analysis examines the interwoven roles of risk assessment, management and communication – defined as risk analysis – and applies these concepts to problems and policy development in food safety. This course will aid students in developing the ability to critically examine food safety risk issues from various stakeholder perspectives, leading to risk management and communication activities to reduce the impact of foodborne disease.
A significant portion of the course will focus on the importance of thorough research and good communication skills, as well as the suitability of communication efforts. The emphasis on acquiring and critically evaluating electronic information will assist students in further developing lifelong learning skills. The course will be presented through lectures, case study presentations, and Internet-based support material including text, audio and video through the extensive database maintained by Dr. Douglas Powell of Kansas State University and colleagues in food safety. This course will be of interest to anyone in the food industry, food safety regulators, public health inspectors, food service managers and others.
A complete course syllabus is available here. Or e-mail me, dpowell@ksu.edu.
For enrolment information, visit the Kansas State Division of Continuing Education website at http://www.dce.k-state.edu/ and click on Courses at the top of the page to search for it. Interested individuals can click the Add Class to Interest List button. This will prompt the student to either log into iSIS if they are currently a student and enroll, or provide information about applying to the university if they are not a student.
I have nothing to do with the prices. But at least it’s not a humanities degree (that’s a joke; see video below).
There’s no shortage of food safety press releases, repeated and regurgitated using funky new media tools; there is a shortage of evidence-based, incisive approaches that challenge food safety norms and may eventually lead to fewer sick people.
barfblog.com is the fastest way to stay current on food safety issues. Powell, Chapman and assorted food safety friends offer evidence-based .jpg)
opinions on current food safety issues. Opinions must be reliable – with references — rapid and relevant.
Anyone can subscribe directly to barfblog.com and receive an e-mail immediately when something new is posted. Go to barfblog.com and click on the ‘subscribe’ button on the right side of the page.
Food safety infosheets are designed to influence food handler practices by utilizing four attributes culled from education, behavioral science and communication literature:
• surprising and compelling messages;
• putting actions and their consequence in context;
• generating discussion within the target audiences’ environments; and
• using verbal narrative, or storytelling, as a message delivery device.
Food safety infosheets are based on stories about outbreaks of foodborne illness. Four criteria are used to select the story: discussion of a foodborne illness outbreak; discussion of background knowledge of a pathogen (including symptoms, etiology and transmission); food handler control practices; and emerging food safety issues. Food safety infosheets also contain evidence-based prescriptive information to prevent or mitigate foodborne illness related to food handling. They are available in several languages.
The bites.ksu.edu listserv is a free web-based mailing list where information about current and emerging food safety issues is provided, gathered from journalistic and scientific sources around the world and 
condensed into short items or stories that make up the daily postings. The listserv has been issued continuously since 1994 and is distributed daily via e-mail to thousands of individuals worldwide from academia, industry, government, the farm community, journalists and the public at large.
The listserv is designed to:
• convey timely and current information for direction of research, diagnostic or investigative activities;
• identify food risk trends and issues for risk management and communication activities; and
• promote awareness of public concerns in scientific and regulatory circles.
The bites listserv functions as a food safety news aggregator, summarizing available information that can be can be useful for risk managers in proactively anticipating trends and reactively address issues. The bites editor (me – dp) does not say whether a story is right or wrong or somewhere in between, but rather that a specific story is available today for public discussion.
If you only want to receive specific news, use RSS feeds.
RSS (Rich Site Summary, or Really Simple Syndication) is a format for delivering regularly changing web content. Many news-related sites, weblogs and other online publishers syndicate their content as an RSS Feed to whoever wants it.
If you only want stories about food safety policy, or norovirus, go to 
bites.ksu.edu and click on that section. Then click on the RSS symbol, and add to your reader. barfblog.com is also available as a RSS feed.
Breaking food safety news items that eventually appear in bites-l or barfblog.com are often posted on Twitter (under barfblog or benjaminchapman) for faster public notification.
These are the various information products we deliver daily, in addition to research, training and outreach. Sponsorship opportunities are available for bites.ksu.edu, barfblog.com, and the bites-l listserv.
Any money is used to support the on-going expenses of the news-gathering and distribution activities, and to develop the next generation of high school, undergraduate and graduate students who will integrate science and communication skills to deliver compelling food safety messages using a variety of media. Research, training and outreach are all connected in our food safety world.
Kansas State University came out with their version of the Chapman and me and other Blue Rodeo groupies study this morning.
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Posting graphical, concise food safety information sheets in the kitchens of restaurants can help reduce dangerous food safety practices and create a workplace culture that values safe food, according to a new paper co-authored by Kansas State University’s Doug Powell.
The study, "Assessment of food safety practices of food service food handlers: testing a communication intervention," was published in the June issue of the Journal of Food Protection. It was authored by Ben Chapman, assistant professor of food safety at the North Carolina State University; Powell, associate professor of food safety at K-State; Katie Filion, master’s student in biomedical science at K-State; and Tiffany Eversley and Tanya MacLaurin of the University of Guelph in Canada.
It’s the first time that a communication intervention using food safety info sheets has been validated to work, Powell said.
Powell and Chapman came up with the idea for food safety info sheets to promote discussion and improve food safety behaviors while playing hockey at the University of Guelph in 2003. Chapman was a graduate student at the time.
"Chapman and I played hockey a lot, and there was a bar and restaurant that overlooked the one ice surface where we often had after-hockey food safety meetings with our industry, provincial and federal government colleagues," Powell said. "We had all this food safety information, and the manager of the restaurant was into food safety, so we thought that if daily sports pages are posted on the walls and doors of washroom stalls, why not post engaging food safety information in kitchens for restaurant employees to read."
As part of his doctoral research, Chapman partnered with a food service company in Canada and placed small video cameras in unobtrusive spots around eight food-service kitchens that volunteered to participate in the study. There were as many as eight cameras in each kitchen, which recorded directly to computer files that were reviewed by Chapman and others.
The work built on other direct food safety observational studies conducted at K-State and published in the British Food Journal in 2009.
Food safety info sheets, highlighting the importance of hand washing or preventing cross-contamination, for example, were then introduced into the kitchens, and video was again collected. The researchers found that cross-contamination events decreased by 20 percent, and hand-washing attempts increased by 7 percent.
The increases show the information sheets work, Powell said. "Food safety messages like ‘Employees must wash hands’ signs in bathrooms just don’t work," he said.
Since September 2006 more than 150 food safety info sheets have been produced and are available for anyone to use, http://www.foodsafetyinfosheets.com. The website has a search function and offers automatic email alerts and RSS feeds.
K-State’s Filion coded much of the video as an undergraduate student researcher in Canada. MacLaurin, who collaborated on the research, was born on a farm/ranch in Kansas and received all her degrees from K-State before joining the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management at the University of Guelph in 1991, where she subsequently collaborated with Powell.
The paper and study abstract are available at:
?http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/iafp/jfp/2010/00000073/00000006/art00013
Contact: Dr. Doug Powell, dpowell@ksu.edu
785-317-0560
barfblog.com
bites.ksu.edu
Posting graphical, concise food safety stories in the back kitchens of restaurants can help reduce dangerous food safety practices and create a workplace culture that values safe food.
It’s the first time that a communication intervention such as food safety information sheets have been validated to work using direct video observation in eight commercial restaurant kitchens.
“The food safety messages we’ve looked at are as effective as those ‘Employees must wash hands’ signs in bathrooms.,” said Dr. Douglas Powell, an associate professor of food safety at Kansas State University and one of the co-authors on a new paper in the Journal of Food Protection. “They just don’t work.”
Powell and then graduate student, Ben Chapman, now an assistant professor of food safety at North Carolina State University, came up with the idea for food safety infosheets to promote discussion and improve food safety behaviors while playing hockey at the University of Guelph in 2003.
“Chapman and I were playing hockey a lot,” says Powell, “and there was a bar and restaurant that overlooked the one ice surface where we often engaged in after-hockey food safety meetings with our industry, provincial and federal government colleagues. We had all this food safety information, and the manager of the bar around 2003 was into food safety, so we thought, if daily sports pages are posted above urinals and on the doors of washroom stalls, why not engaging food safety information?”
As part of his PhD research, Chapman partnered with a food service company in Canada and placed small video cameras in unobtrusive spots around eight food-service kitchens that volunteered to participate in the study. There were as many as eight cameras in each kitchen, which recorded directly to computer files and later reviewed by Chapman and others.
The work built on other direct food safety observational studies conducted at Kansas State University and published in the British Food Journal in 2009.
Food safety inforsheets, highlighting the importance of handwashing or preventing cross-contamination, for example, were then introduced into the kitchens, and video was again collected. The researchers found that cross-contamination events decreased by 20 per cent, and handwashing attempts increased by 7 per cent.
Since September 2006 over 150 food safety infosheets have been produced and are available to anyone at www.foodsafetyinfosheets.com. The website has had a recent redesign, adding a search function, automatic email alerts and RSS feeds.
Katie Filion, who coded much of the video as an undergraduate student researcher, has moved from Canada and is now completing a Master’s degree with Powell at Kansas State University. She has just returned from a year of research with the New Zealand Food Safety Authority helping to design a national restaurant inspection disclosure system.
Dr. Tanya MacLurin, who collaborated on the research, was born on a farm/ranch in Kansas and received all her degrees from Kansas State University before joining the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management at the University of Guelph in 1991, where she subsequently collaborated with Powell.
The study, “Assessment of food safety practices of food service food handlers : testing a communication intervention” was authored by Dr. Ben Chapman of North Carolina State University, Dr. Douglas Powell and Katie Filion of Kansas State University, and Tiffany Eversley and Tanya MacLaurin of the University of Guelph in Canada. The study is published in the June issue of the Journal of Food Protection.
“Assessment of Food Safety Practices of Food Service Food Handlers: Testing a Communication Intervention”
Authors: Benjamin J. Chapman, North Carolina State University; Douglas A. Powell, Katie Fillion, Kansas State University; Tiffany Eversley, Tanya MacLaurin, University of Guelph
Published: June 2010, Journal of Food Protection
Abstract: Globally, foodborne illness affects an estimated 30% of individuals annually. Meals prepared outside of the home are a risk factor for acquiring foodborne illness and have been implicated in up to 70% of traced outbreaks. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has called on food safety communicators to design new methods and messages aimed at increasing food safety risk-reduction practices from farm to fork. Food safety infosheets, a novel 
communication tool designed to appeal to food handlers and compel behavior change, were evaluated. Food safety infosheets were provided weekly to food handlers in working foodservice operations for 7 weeks. It was hypothesized that through the posting of food safety infosheets in highly visible locations, such as kitchen work areas and hand washing stations, that safe food handling behaviors of foodservice staff could be positively influenced. Using video observation, food handlers (n ~ 47) in eight foodservice operations were observed for a total of 348 h (pre- and postintervention combined). After the food safety infosheets were introduced, food handlers demonstrated a significant increase (6.7%, P , 0.05, 95% confidence interval) in mean hand washing attempts, and a significant reduction in indirect cross-contamination events (19.6%, P , 0.05, 95% confidence interval). Results of the research demonstrate that posting food safety infosheets is an effective intervention tool that positively influences the food safety behaviors of food handlers.
A blogger named Jenny called me last week and asked me how I buy meat.
So this is what I told her as documented in her blog, Dinner A Love Story.
My first guest is Doug Powell, associate professor, food safety, Dept. Diagnostic Medicine/Pathobiology, Kansas State University and the father of five girls. His entertainingly combative barfblog.com regularly takes Whole Foods and (no!!!) Michael Pollan to task.
So Doug Powell, how do you buy meat?
“I go to the biggest supermarket I can find — Dillons, Walmart, Krogers. I’ll buy a whole chicken at Dillons for some ridiculously low price, like 99 cents a pound. Because I know they have quality control measures in place to reduce microbial loads before they get in the store. I would never shop at any of those places like Whole Foods. What they are peddling is complete nonsense from a safety point a view. Whole Foods is so concerned about being natural and whatever else that they don’t pay attention to the basics like cross-contamination. They’re sloppy about that.
“It’s not about lovingly raising an animal which I’m sure lots of farmers do. It’s about testing. In separate USA Today stories last year, both Costco and McDonalds were highlighted for their rigorous safety standards. I’m not talking quality here, I’m talking safety. Given the number of things they serve, those places can’t afford to screw up.
“When I buy ground beef, I treat it like hazardous waste, and make burgers mixed with about 20 per cent ground turkey. A butcher grinding meat in front of me means nothing from a safety perspective. If there’s poop on the outside, it’s now on the inside, which is why I always — always — use a tip-sensitive digital thermometer to make sure any food is properly cooked. There’s just too many people out there getting sick.”
Maybe it’s time to get back to the family compound in Newport, Wales.
Health officials in Newport are investigating eight cases of salmonella at the city’s Royal Gwent Hospital.
A hospital spokesman said it was not yet clear whether those suffering from the bacterial infection had caught it in the community or in hospital.
GPs in the area have been contacted to alert them to the possibility the bug may be present in the community.
Salmonella is usually associated with eating contaminated foods. The eight people are said to be recovering well.
Some showed symptoms of the illness when they came into hospital but others did not, the spokesman said.