The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) identified a total of 5,778 outbreaks of illness linked to specific foods, involving 168,898 individual illnesses that occurred between 1990 and 2006. An outbreak involves two or more ill people. The food categories most commonly linked to outbreaks were:
• Seafood: 1,140 outbreaks involving 11,809 cases
Late last summer, Rosemary Alvarez of Phoenix thought she had a brain tumor. But on the operating table her doctor discovered something even more unsightly — a parasitic worm eating her brain. When Alvarez awoke, she heard the good news that she was tumor-free and she would make a full recovery. But she also
Today, seventeen months after the first reported illness and thirteen months after the recall, the CDC finally issues its final report on the 2007 Salmonella serotype I 4,5,12:i:-* infections. The CDC report summarizes the results of the investigation, which determined that 401 cases of salmonellosis occurred in 41 states during 2007, with 32% of ill
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Dawn Withers, a.k.a. “the lettuce lady,” reports tonight what has long been suspected and rumored; the Salinas Valley is again the likely source of yet another E. coli O157:H7 outbreak. The “Lettuce Lady” quotes Ken August from the California Department of Public Health that it is investigating whether a Salinas Valley farm is the source
The Capital Press reported today that the U.S. Justice Department filed suit (Here is Complaint) against McAfee in a U.S. district court Thursday, Nov. 20, claiming that he endangered public health by violating a federal law against interstate commerce in unpasteurized milk.
"Raw milk and raw milk products contain a wide variety of
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I had a great meeting yesterday with ConAgra Foods. I met with a number of food safety employees and ConAgra’s Food Safety Board last time I visited Omaha a few months ago. According to its website and from what I can see, “ConAgra Foods has developed rigorous food-safety practices in all our facilities and manufacturing
According to press reports this morning, an Arizona researcher found 40 percent of meat products tested from three national chain stores were contaminated with bacteria normally associated with severe hospital infections. Federal health officials, however, say more study is needed to determine whether C. diff is transmitted through food. A potentially deadly intestinal germ increasingly
In April 2007, Rick Perlstein penned a piece entitled “E. Coli Conservatism.” His bottom line was the “Conservatism has been killing Americans. The recent food safety crisis is only one case study.” Perhaps he is in part right. However, whatever the political reasons for the “food safety crisis,” it has been long in coming and
I am still in Washington DC until Saturday morning. Had a series of great meetings today including one with FSIS staff where I presented our non-E. coli O157:H7 shiga-toxin E. coli test results which I hope to publish in the next few months. I got to keep the badge.
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