Cereal Link to Food Poisoning Is Probed

[flashl]

Source: Chicago Tribune

MINNEAPOLIS - At least 23 people in 14 states have been sickened by the same strain of salmonella found in two breakfast cereals recalled by Malt-O-Meal, the federal Food and Drug Administration said Saturday.

...

Malt-O-Meal voluntarily recalled its unsweetened Puffed Rice and Puffed Wheat cereals April 5 after finding salmonella contamination during routine testing. The affected bags were produced in the past 12 months in Northfield.

Three people have been hospitalized, but no deaths have been reported, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

...

The FDA said people who experience such symptoms after eating a puffed wheat or puffed rice cereal made by Malt-O-Meal should contact their doctors and report the illness to state or local health authorities.

Chicago Tribune

Read more: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-ap-cereal-recall,1,3203715,print.story

[flashl]

1. CDC Comments ...

The CDC said that as of Friday it had received reports of 21 people ill with the same salmonella strain in 13 states. California reported 1; Colorado, 1; Delaware, 1; Maine, 3; Massachusetts, 2; Minnesota, 1; North Dakota, 1; New Hampshire, 2; New Jersey, 3; New York, 3; Pennsylvania, 1; Rhode Island, 1; and Vermont, 1.

It wasn't clear Saturday what the 14th state was or whether the two additional cases were from there.

[santamargarita]

2. Fascist Government at work! Anyone for Mad Cow Disease?

K&R

[OKthatsIT]

17. Wild deer, elk, are also getting the 'wasting' disease.

STOP the SECRET GOVT AEROSOL SPRAYING PROGRAMS NOW!

[leftrightwingnut]

3. How does breakfast cereal baked in an oven become contaminated with Salmonella?

Does the same plant also process raw chicken? Or fresh vegetables?

[OhioChick]

4. That's What I was Wondering. n/t

[bitchkitty]

7. Scary, isn't it?

About 15 years ago, in Georgia, there was a news report on the presence of fecal coliform bacteria found in vats of iced tea in Atlanta area restaurants. Not off the wall places, all popular, recognizable chains. I don't think they ever figured out where it came from, but my theory is that the ground water where the tea was planted was contaminated.

However, you would think that salmonella would not survive the processing necessary to produce cereal.

[LeftyMom]

10. The fecal coliform bacteria probably came from people not washing their hands

after using the restroom, and then handling the equipment used to prepare the tea.

I would assume that the drying process would kill off most bacteria on the tea leaves.

[bitchkitty]

14. You would think - they

said something about that, but the levels were very high, that they really couldn't explain how that much would get in there. Again, these were chain restaurants, not to sing the praises of chains but I worked in several and the clean up of those types of things was militant, to say the least.

[jmowreader]

19. That's possible...

You can buy Iced Tea Concentrate in half-gallon jugs in any supermarket in North Carolina. Perfect for foodservice operations of any size, you prepare a delicious vat of iced tea by mixing this with water to taste. I can only assume you can get it in gallon jugs and five-gallon cubitainers. (Now this is SCARY...I ran into an outfit on the Internets at http://www.jamestea.com...that sells tea concentrate in bottles that look just like two-stroke oil bottles. I've already written them.)

Fecal coliform shows up in water too...if for some reason the water supply to the iced tea concentrate manufacturer was contaminated (or, like you said, the machine operator doesn't wash his hands) it would distribute fecal coliform to a lot of people in many states.

[Nikia]

8. Although I am not sure how salmonella would survive heat

From working in the food processing industry, I know that grain processing is not the cleanest food operation. Meat and dairy processing equipment is cleaned often, at least daily, with detergents and hot water. That isn't done in grain processing. While the risk of there being salmonella on grain is much less, if it somehow gets into the equipment, it is in the equipment for possibly a long time. Grain has low water activity which inhibits bacteria from growing, but if water somehow entered the system, there could be a problem.

[FirstLight]

5. ...and people wonder why I want to grow my own food!

...I tell you, things are getting scarier & scarier....


and, EWWW....I can't imagine how salmonella would get transmitted into cereal. Are we being fed ground up chicken bones like in pet foods? EWWW....

:scared:

Don't MESS with my Apple Jacks, man!:evilgrin:




edit: punctuation, thought is was a spot on my screen :blush:

[OKthatsIT]

16. NO GMO, no industrial waste fertilizers, no irradiation....

sounds like a good idea..GROW YOUR OWN FOOD! I invested in a canning supplies, dehydrator, composter and now I'm growing 'worm box' fertizer in my garage. Nothing but the cleanest organic soil and food.

The only thing left to worry about is the CHEMTRAILS KILLING THE BEES.

[qanda]

6. My mother used to make us eat puffed rice

I always knew that stuff could kill you.

[tridim]

12. I agree, that stuff was disgusting.

Especially when Rice Crispies were so tasty.

[truthisfreedom]

9. This is the first case of salmonella I've heard of being spread in a dry product.

Scary.

[mackdaddy]

11. Vitamin Fortified means stuff sprayed on at the end of processing.

My mother kept getting "stomach flu" about 4 years ago. It turned out the store brand oat-O's were later recalled as being contaminated, I am pretty sure with salmonella.
The Vitamin Fortification is a spray on product which is one of the last steps in processing, after all of the cooking. The Chemical delivery truck had some contaminated valves or hoses and this introduced the contamination.

She would only eat these once every two weeks or so, and that explained the recurrent stomach flu. When they finally recalled them, she looked up the box id still in the cupboard, and sure enough on the recall list.

Mom was in her late sixties then, and it is lucky this did not just kill her.

[tridim]

13. This is probably the culprit. I just learned about the process on "How It's Made"

I always assumed the vitamin fortification was at the grain flour level. Might as well just take a vitamin, it's the same thing.

[leftrightwingnut]

15. Holy shit! (Pardon the pun.)

How the hell do the hoses or valves on a chemical truck carrying product intended for human consumption become "contaminated"?

I thought that there were regulations about what tanker trucks could carry. I would hate to think that the same tanker trucks that were carrying human food ingredients were also carrying stuff with traces of fecal waste.

No doubt we will hear about how the Bush administration has been relaxing those regulations.

If I could buy my "charms" from a local maker -- I would.

[InfiniteNether]

18. All y'all do yourselves a favor and start eating organic foods.

Not only have I lost weight, but I feel a lot better, too. Less headaches and stomach problems.

[FloridaJudy]

20. I hate to break the news

But shit is organic. Eating nothing but organic food might guarantee one's not exposed to pesticides and artificial hormones, but won't insure against exposure to coliform bacteria.

There was a fascinated article in Harper's recently that was about, well, shit. Where it goes when the toilet is flushed, and what happens to it after. Turns out human shit is dried, sterilized, and sold as organic fertilizer. That may be an icky concept to some, but I suspect that the chances of pathologic bacteria surviving the drying, deodorizing, and heating process is virtually nil (and besides it's recycling at its most basic). But even organic produce can become contaminated after it's picked: it gets washed with contaminated water, some picker didn't wash his or her hands adequately, and - whoops! - your organic arugula has everybody barfing and running for the john.

It would probably be safe if you grew all your own produce (and raised your own cows and chickens!), but even then, if your local groundwater is contaminated, all bets are off.

[fed-up]

21. k/r nt