What Are the Real Culprits Getting People Sick at a Barbeque Joint, and Eating Peppers?
Tuesday, July 22, 2008 at 01:01PM
Bingo! The U.S. Food and Drug Administration thinks it’s finally found the culprit in all the salmonella cases, and it says it’s jalepeno peppers.
And where would we be in all this attention given to foodborne illnesses, without a word from Bill Marler, the lawyer germ chaser. He’s filed a suit on behalf of a couple that apparently got sick at a Georgia rib joint. What’s interesting to me is his call for more legislation.
In a press release, he says, “Where is the legislation to prevent these illnesses?…These people should not be in ICU, fighting for their lives, just because they went out to dinner. We have the ability to legislate, regulate, and eliminate E. coli from our food supply, and we need to see Congressional action.”
I’m not sure what legislation he’s talking about that would prevent such illnesses. Maybe the National Animal Identification System (NAIS)? But would NAIS prevent such illnesses, by enabling regulators to track cattle and pigs back to the source?
Michigan lawyer Steve Bemis, a board member of the Farm to
Consumer Legal Defense Fund, tried to put a damper on that thinking in
connection with the organization’s suit against the U.S. Department of
Agriculture and the Michigan Department of Agriculture: "It is important to realize, that NAIS is not about food safety--the program supposedly is to track animals for issues of animal health, and besides doing this poorly or not at all...NAIS in fact would stop all tracking at the point of slaughter. And, as we have learned in many recent meat recalls, what happens after slaughter when meat may be contaminated and comingled is where the problem lies. NAIS would offer nothing, even if it were fully implemented, to assist in such food safety concerns. Food safety, as the meat and tomato recalls illustrate, is a far different problem. There is one commonality, however--the small diversified farms which will be harmed by NAIS, are the same farms which bring locally grown meat and produce to local farmers' markets. Damaging these small farms economically IS a food safety issue, since local food is demonstrably some of the safest food which Americans can count on, as against the current broken system which corporate agriculture offers."
(The suit is in the process of being filed--it's official filing has been delayed by some judicial technical issues, which should be resolved any day, says the FTCLDF.)
If there's one thing Marler has right, it's that there has been an increase in outbreaks of foodborne illness cases involving E.coli 0157:H7. But if you look at the evidence about how E.coli 0157:H7 originates--some of it per Sylvia's links in her comment following my posting of July 16--much of it has to do with how cattle are fed in the factory food system, and can be improved with pasture feeding. Why don't people like Marler talk about that?
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http://www.marlerblog.com/2008/07/articles/lawyer-oped/e-coli-o157h7-is-a-powerful-and-deadly-bacterium/
Jeez, what a doof!
While we're at doofexperts, now the FDA is doing a backpedal move, because the Salmonella found ISN'T Saintpaul,
FDA Briefing 7/21/08: (1) Jalapeno pepper sample from Agricola Zaragosa, a distribution center in McAllen Texas, tests positive for the Salmonella Saintpaul outbreak strain. (2) A recall is now under way. (3) The peppers were grown in Mexico, but FDA emphasized that the product was not necessarily contaminated in Mexico, and the outbreak investigation is ongoing. (4) FDA expands consumer message (warning) not to consumer fresh jalapeno peppers and products made from fresh jalapeno peppers. The expanded warning does not apply to processed or pickled jalapeno peppers.
Cheers - sorry I have been away for a bit - chasing BIG BAD BEEF.
You cannot see it, taste it, or smell it. 250,000 E. coli O157:H7 (E. coli) bacteria will fit on the head of a pin. Ten to 50 will kill your child or your grandmother.
More likely due the expertise of Children’s Hospitals, and other top medical centers around the country, deaths at times are avoided, however, often not before Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome (HUS) nearly kills. HUS, a complication from an E. coli infection, can cause severe damage to kidneys, intestines, and pancreas. Falling into a coma and suffering further from cognitive impairment are all too common.
I’ve seen the inside of too many of those Intensive Care Units with families who are scared senseless as they watch their children or mother shutdown. For 15 years, this has been my world. When I was an undergraduate, I read Upton Sinclair’s, The Jungle. That book took the American public on a tour of the contaminated underbelly of the meat industry and they were sickened. It led to the Pure Food & Drug Act and the Federal Meat Inspection Act, versions of which are still in place today.
Until 1993, I thought—because of those laws—that the United States had a safe and secure food supply. But, then came the Jack-in-the-Box E. coli outbreak. It killed four, and sickened hundreds, including many who were gravely ill with HUS and related complications. Many of those victims became my clients.
Once again, there was a public outcry for safe meat. The Food Safety & Inspection Service responded by creating and aggressively enforcing the Mandatory Risk Management System. Based on research and practices of the U.S. Space Program, the risk management system established checkpoints at every phase of meat processing.
The presence of E. coli was defined as an adulterant under the Federal Meat Inspection Act. I continued to sue “Big Meat” as most of my clients up to 2002 were children who were made sick by eating E. coli contaminated meat. I recovered over $350 million during this period from the meat industry and the restaurants they supplied in verdicts and settlements on behalf of those clients. In 2003 recalls of meat laced with E. coli began to decline. After 24 million pounds of contaminated beef were recalled in 34 separate incidents in 2002, recalls dropped off to just over a million pounds a year for the next three years, and then to just 181,900 pounds in 2006. The Centers of Disease Control and Prevention saw E. coli – related illnesses drop 48%.
But then came Spring 2007. E. coli, which begins its life in the hindgut of a cow, mounted a surge on its home court. And, it came back with a vengeance. Thirty-three million pounds of beef would be recalled in 22 incidents. All over the country, slaughterhouses, packing and distribution centers, retail outlets, and restaurants were once again testing positive for E. coli and people-mostly children-were getting seriously sick.
The American meat supply, which had again been touted as safest in the world, tumbled back into disarray. But, why?
As with any unexplained mystery, theories abound. Could it really just be meat industry complacency? Did everyone respond to the good numbers in 2006 by taking a long nap? Did meat processors slack off—consciously or unconsciously—and relax their testing procedures?
Or could it be better reporting? Doctors are more aware of E. coli now, and perhaps when patients present symptoms of food poisoning; tests are more likely to be ordered. When the presence of E coli is found and reported, a recall is triggered.
There’s always global warming. Seriously though – very smart people have posited that droughts in the southeast and southwest have launched more fecal dust into the air, which then finds its way into beef slaughtering plants. It has also been suggested that the deluging rainfall in other areas created muddy pens—an ideal environment for E. coli.
While we’re at it, why not blame high oil prices? High gas prices have fueled (sorry) the growth of ethanol plants. These plants are often built next to feedlots, and a byproduct of the ethanol production process—distiller’s grains—is considered an excellent (and cheap) alternative to corn for cattle feed. Unfortunately, research at Kansas State University associates the use of distiller’s grains as feed with an increase in the incidence of E. coli in the hindguts of cattle.
Another controversial issue may affect the meat supply. The New York Times reported that immigration officials began a crackdown at slaughterhouses across the country in the fall of 2006. Experienced—albeit undocumented—workers have been cleared out and replaced with unskilled, inexperienced labor.
And then there’s Darwin. Another theory holds that interventions have caused the wily E. coli microbes to adapt, selecting pathogens that are more resistant to detection or intervention. E. coli back in our meat cannot be tolerated. We’ve got a lot of summer of 2008 left. Summer has always been kind to the E. coli bug. More than 5.6 million pounds of E. coli contaminated beef has been recalled so far in 2008, most supplied by Nebraska Beef Ltd., via the Kroger Grocery chain. All of which is responsible for a multi-state outbreak of E. coli that again is filling up the ICU’s in Hospitals in the seven states.
What is being done? Not much.
Congress has held some hearings, but the only new reform is that the names of retail stores that received meat and poultry involved in recalls with high health risk will be made public. Good as far as it goes.
However, despite 76,000,000 American’s being sickened, 325,000 hospitalized and 5,000 deaths each year, food safety has not made it as a Presidential campaign issue. Congress, Democrats and Republicans, have about run out its clock. But E. coli is back in our meat and we better care.
Solutions?
Might I suggest:
* Improve surveillance of bacterial and viral diseases. First responders - ER physicians and local doctors - need to be encouraged to test for pathogens and report findings directly to local and state health departments and the CDC promptly. Right now, for every person counted in an outbreak there are some 20 to 40 times those that are sick but never tested. The more we test, the quicker we know we have an outbreak and the quicker it can be stopped.
* These same governmental departments, whether local, state or federal, need to learn to “play well together.” Turf battles need to take a back seat to stopping an outbreak and tracking it to its source. That means resources need to be provided and coordination encouraged so illnesses can be promptly stopped and the offending producer - not an entire industry - are brought to heal.
* Require real training and certification of food handlers at restaurants and grocery stores. There also should be incentives for ill employees not to come to work when ill. We should impose fines and penalties on employers who do not cooperate.
* Stiffen license requirements for large farm, retail and wholesale food outlets, so that nobody gets a license until they and their employees have shown they understand the hazards and how to avoid them.
* Increase food inspections. While domestic production has continued to be a problem, imports pose an increasing risk, especially if terrorists were to get into the act. Points of export and entry are a logical place to step up monitoring. We need more inspectors - domestically and abroad - and we need to require that they receive the training in how to identify and control hazards.
* Reorganize federal, state and local food safety agencies to increase cooperation and reduce wasteful overlap and conflicts. Reform federal, state and local agencies to make them more proactive, and less reactive. This too requires financial resources and accountability. We also need to modernize food safety statutes by replacing the existing collection of often conflicting laws and regulation with one uniform food safety law of the highest standard.
* There are too few legal consequences for sickening or killing customers by selling contaminated food. We should impose stiff fines, and even prison sentences for violators, and even stiffer penalties for repeat violators.
* We need to use our technology to make food more traceable so that when an outbreak occurs authorities can quickly identify the source and limit the spread of the contamination and stop the disruption to the economy. When I buy a book on line I can track it all the way to my mailbox. However, we have yet to find the source of a tomato (or salsa) outbreak after months of sickening hundreds.
* Promote university research to develop better technologies to make food safe and for testing foods for contamination. Provide tax breaks for companies that push food safety research and employee training. Greatly expand irradiation of raw hamburger and other high-risk products.
* Improve consumer understanding of the risks of food-borne illness. Foster a popular campaign similar to Mothers Against Drunk Driving, which uses consumer power to promote a no-tolerance policy toward growers and companies that produce tainted food.
* Provide Presidential leadership on a topic that impacts every single one of us.
Not Saintpaul - period,
http://www.fda.gov/oc/po/firmrecalls/agricola_zaragoza07_08.html
http://www.fda.gov/oc/po/firmrecalls/grandeproduce07_08.html
http://www.fortmilltimes.com/124/story/229502.html
It seems very few talk of the environment, bovine nutrition and overall health when referring to the end products. You are what you eat and cows are no different.
If a human lives in squalor, poor nutrition, they have an enormous potential for disease. Of those who live that way, they may be placed in a mental facility.
You want safer food, you need to transition to a local diversified small farm system. But to do that you need less regulation, not more.
If we support the local,sustainable farmer and go back to eating food that had some nutrition in it, we would all be healthier as would the economy and the animals, plants, soil and earth.
If you look at the historical information of when we started pasteurization it was born out of the use of distiller grain as feed and the pre-cursor to the modern day confinement feed lot. We now use the same bad science and haven't learned our lesson. Instead of distiller grain from alcohol production in the post-prohibition era we are feeding the livestock the distiller grain from ethanol production. Biofuels are the new hot commodity, just as alcohol was post-prohibition.
Funny how history repeats.
Lisa
“The Hartford Connecticut Courant reported that The Town Farm Dairy has stopped producing and selling milk and milk products indefinitely after four people contracted E. coli O157:H7, linked to raw milk they bought from the Simsbury farm. We learned that the four ill are children ages 2-7 and that some, if not all, developed Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome.”
I know I sound like a broken record, but E.coli 0157:H7 contamination in raw milk is a very real risk factor and the children are the ones who suffer. We are not living 100 years ago when 0157:H7 did not exist.
I can hear Syliva now….it says linked, it’s not proven. Let’s see how this story unfolds.
http://www.marlerblog.com/2008/07/articles/legal-cases/raw-milk-causing-illness-in-east-midwest-and-west/
Raw Milk Causing Illness in East, Midwest and West
Posted on July 22, 2008 by Food Poisoning Attorney
In breaking news this evening, Connecticut state inspectors are investigating raw milk from a Simsbury dairy farm after reported illnesses. The State Department of Agriculture is looking at whether the raw, unpasteurized milk from Town Farm Dairy on Wolcott Street is responsible for making people sick after a number of illnesses have been reported. The dairy has voluntarily shut down production and its store while inspectors investigate.
We are representing a young girl sickened with Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome by E. coli O157:H7 in Missouri. Press reports - Raw milk thought to sicken one with E. coli O157:H7 in Missouri. Radio station KSMU reports in this podcast that a local resident has contracted E. coli O157:H7 and that raw milk appears to be a risk factor. Hear it all at KSMU News.
We are also investigating a guillain-barre syndrome case from Crescent City, California that was caused by a Campylobacter infection induced by raw milk consumption. The victim has been hospitalized on a ventilator now for 5 weeks.
We are also continuing litigation on behalf of two children who suffered severe E. coli O157:H7 infections (HUS) after consuming raw milk products produced by Organic Pastures.
Simsbury Town Farm Dairy Linked to Raw Milk E. coli Outbreak
http://www.marlerblog.com/2008/07/articles/case-news/simsbury-town-farm-dairy-linked-to-raw-milk-e-coli-outbreak/
The Hartford Conneticutt Courant reported that The Town Farm Dairy has stopped producing and selling milk and milk products indefinitely
after four people contracted E. coli O157:H7, linked to raw milk they bought from the Simsbury farm. We learned that the four ill are children ages 2-7 and that some, if not all, developed Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome.
I have been blogging about raw milk for awhile – I am busier than ever.
Ecoli 0157H7 was borne as a result of antibiotic abuse in animal feeding and sloppy medical doctors that prescribed it like candy for everything including viruses.
It is the American Immune System Stupid....
Pathogens are only pathogens in suseptible bodies. That is why you rarely if ever find a dairy family getting sick when others do.
We have steriled our American diet and our American immune systems and we have supercharged the pathogens at the same time.
It would appear that although some of Marlers ideas are really good some are down right blind and crazy.
Putting farmers in jail for producing the safest food possible. I know of not one farmer that would ever intentionally place an unsafe piece of food into commerce. Talk about eliminating food!! Put the farmers in jail thats a real good idea...???!!!
Marler is a leader and should take up the fight against the real culprits...the drug companies that kill hundreds of thousands per year and weaken our immune systems thus opening the profitable waste gate of immune depression and the American bacteria phobia.
The answer lies in rebuilding Americas immune systems and stopping the creation of resistant superbugs.
Step one...Drink your biodiverse, tested and safe raw milk and improve your immune system.
Marler, we need some of your passion fighting the real fight. I think you and I would get along really well. We should meet and talk about fixing the real problems in America.
Ever wonder why things are getting worse....?
Perhaps the wrong questions are being asked of the wrong people.
Mark McAfee
I followed the links you gave in response to Kirsten. The last one (the FDA Grande Produce recall), has this at the very top:
"NOTE: According to the Texas and North Carolina Departments of Health, the strain of Salmonella found in this company's jalapeño and serrano peppers and in its avocado is not Salmonella Saintpaul, and is not believed to be related to the current Salmonella outbreak."
As Kirsten said, not saintpaul in this case.
As Bill Marler noted, there are TWO different Salmonella outbreaks in the national news due to TWO different Salmonella strains. The SaintPaul investigation is alive and well - recent update:
http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/health/25837094.html?location_refer=sports
'Team Diarrhea' helped state crack salmonella case
Minnesota investigators used bloodhound-like sleuthing to ID the source of a mysterious salmonella outbreak: jalapeno peppers.
By JOSEPHINE MARCOTTY and MAURA LERNER , Star Tribune staff writers
Last update: July 24, 2008 - 6:05 AM
In less than two weeks, Minnesota Department of Health investigators traced the source of a mysterious salmonella outbreak that had stumped federal health officials for two months and sickened more than 1,200 people in 43 states and Canada.
The culprit: jalapeno peppers.
What if this crackerjack team were on the case in April instead of July?
In the FDA's quest to find an answer for this outbreak they chose a scapegoat they thought they could prove guilty by past association: tomatoes. They lazily asserted this association with zero epidemiological proof. They didn't interview a control population to compare the sick ones to. Major faux-pas.
This has cost the tomato industry millions of dollars.
Now, how likely is it that Salmonella is going to grow in a hot pepper laden with capsaicin? And are serrano and jalepeno growers to undergo the same ruin as tomato growers?
It seems it was a processed product with jalepenos that was found to be contaminated with Salmonella in the article you cited. In my opinion, it is far more likely that the contamination was introduced into the relish by processing equipment.
I would *relish* a whole new system, where scientific dirt-digging and proof were the gold standard. The current one of arrogant government officials opining and hiding behind high-falutin' (and unwarranted) titles of"expertise"is getting increasingly dangerous to the American public.