March 2010

  • From the mine is bigger than yours file: How much does foodborne illness cost?

    Posted: March 3rd, 2010 - 2:17pm by Ben Chapman

    Author: 
    Ben Chapman

    At the start of pretty much every talk I’ve given in the past 3 years I have a slide about the societal cost and estimated burden of foodborne illness. I somewhat robotically spout out these two statistics:

    - About 1-in 3 to 1-in-4 individuals will acquire illnesses from food each year
    - The societal burden of these illnesses is estimated to be $1.4 trillion

    The statistics I use come from a variety of sources including USDA Economic Research Service, WHO, CDC, Canadian health officials and Australian public health.

    Today I woke up to a press release from the Produce Safety Coalition, the Make our Food Safe Coalition and the Pew Charitable Trust that cited a “landmark  study” estimating the cost of foodborne illness to be $152 billion annually.


    From the report:
    There are a number of ways to estimate the economic impact of foodborne illness. This report uses an FDA cost-estimate approach: health-related costs are the sum of medical costs (physician services, pharmaceuticals, and hospital costs) and losses to quality of life (lost life expectancy, pain and suffering, and functional disability).

    Hardly landmark, unless you mean this estimate represents  a reduction of almost a factor of 10 in estimated costs since 2007 (I don’t think that was what was intended). Tanya Roberts published a paper in 2007 estimating the cost of foodborne illness from a willingness-to-pay (WTP) standpoint at $1.4 trillion. According to Roberts, WTP is endorsed in the literature as the valuation method most consistent with economic theory and her calculation included all seventy-six million cases of acute food-borne illness. Previous estimates examined only a few specific pathogens.

    Sure, the numbers matter when it comes to prioritizing the need to address or fund food safety work. Whether it’s $6 billion, $152 billion, $1.4 trillion or $2,500-$8,000 per case (pathogen dependant) it’s a huge number. But it’s also very abstract.

    The statistics are nice, but they really don’t grab foodhandlers’ attention. More compelling is where the real cost of foodborne illness is born: with the individuals and in the families of those who have been affected by it. Billions and trillions are fodder for discussions with politicians and boards of directors. Where the real food safety work occurs, both positive and negative, is on the farm, in the restaurant kitchen, supermarket deli and homes. And the numbers don’t really matter there, what resonates is that foodborne illness sucks.

    What matters so much more to individual food handlers who protect public health in the US are the stories of real people being affected by food they trusted would not make them ill.

    The disconnect between statistics and stories is why I follow up the burden slide with more impactful tales of outbreaks that happen weekly.  Like those who have affected real people including Mason Jones and Stephanie Smith both of whom were severely affected by E. coli O157. Tragically, Mason died at only 5 years of age and Stephanie, who is now 23, will probably never walk again.  The numbers, while nice, don’t really do these stories justice.

     

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  • Beetles brought deadly listeria to Prolactal cheese?

    Posted: March 3rd, 2010 - 12:58pm by Doug Powell

    Maybe I’m losing something in translation.

    On Sunday, Prolactal of Austria said in a statement that its Quargel cheese, which has killed 8 or 10 people depending on the source, and has sickened dozens, was contaminated with listeria from using cultures “that do not give enough protection," whatever that means.

    Today, the Styrian weekly newspaper Woche claimed the company said “a scarab or type of beetle (Dungkäfer or aphodius fimetarius) had been the carrier of the disease. Beetles had climbed through a window left open and contaminated machines used to make the cheese.”

    So if making cheese, don’t leave the windows open.

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  • Nosestretcher alert: how much foodborne illness is the fault of home cooks?

    Posted: March 1st, 2010 - 5:48pm by Doug Powell

    Does the majority of foodborne illness really happen in the home?

    The statement is repeatedly repeated, but usually with no supporting data.

    A story most recently proclaimed, “More than 50 percent of foodborne illnesses come from food prepared in the home.”

    There was no reference.

    The stats that have been reported in peer-reviewed journals are all over the place: anywhere from 15-90 per cent of foodborne illness apparently happens in the home.

    So if a consumer ate bagged spinach in fall 2006 at home, would that mean they possibly got sick at home, or that the contamination originated on the farm and there was little consumers could do?

    Casey Jacob and I attempted to tackle this question in the journal, Foodborne Pathogens and Disease, and concluded,

    “Rather than focusing on the location of consumption—and blaming consumers and others—analysis of the steps leading to foodborne illness should center on the causes of contamination in a complex farm-to-fork food safety system.”

    Robert Tauxe of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control noted in a recent talk there have been 10 new food vehicles indentified in multistate outbreaks of foodborne illness since 2006: bagged spinach, carrot juice, peanut butter, broccoli powder on a snack food, dog food, pot pies, canned chili sauce, hot peppers, white pepper and raw cookie dough.

    Few, if any of these have to do with consumers.
     

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  • Canadian Olympic gold hockey post-doctoral fellowship opportunity at UBC

    Posted: March 1st, 2010 - 9:59am by Doug Powell

    Kevin Allen (right, exactly as shown) is the kind of hockey player who would take a slap shot from 20 feet, bounce it off the goalie’s head and then skate by and go, “uh, sorry.”

    I was often the goalie.

    He would then laugh on the bench with the other goons.

    This was odd because Kevin also played goal. I once used his equipment and figured out why he was laughing after hitting me in the head: his goalie gear was way better than mine; couldn’t feel anything, and the stuff was huge. There was no net left to shoot at. How did a graduate student have far better equipment than me?

    I admired Kevin’s hockey skills, and how he could play so much hockey, have a couple of kids and take so long to finish his PhD; I admired his expensive goalie equipment even more.

    Kevin finally finished his PhD at Guelph, won some award at the International Association for Food Protection in 2005, he may have won more, I don’t know, went to work with Bioniche -- the E. coli O157:H7 vaccine people in Canada -- and now has landed himself a professoring job.

    It’s at the University of British Columbia, that’s in Vancouver, where the winter Olympics – what The Daily Show called a series of drunken dares on ice or snow – have just wrapped up, with a parade featuring a giant inflatable beaver.

    Kevin’s building his research empire and, while I don’t run help wanted or conference announcements anymore, I will if they are solely in my self-interest or at least afford me the opportunity to taunt former students. Look at the first sentence of the job description – what was he going to write, a mind-numbing post-doctoral fellowship is available? It probably helps if the candidate plays hockey. Gender doesn’t matter.

    Post-doctoral fellowship opportunity
    The University of British Columbia
    Discipline: Molecular Food Microbiology
    Faculty: Land and Food Systems
    Department: Food, Nutrition and Health
    Location: University of British Columbia Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
    An exciting post-doctoral fellowship is available for an ambitious and highly motivated individual who has recently completed their doctoral degree. This individual will lead a research program focused on utilizing traditional and molecular approaches to examine stress response physiology, comparative genomics, and antimicrobial resistance in foodborne pathogens such as Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli, Listeria monocytogenes, and Vibrio spp. Demonstrated experience with genomics, microarray analysis, and recombinant techniques is highly desirable.
    The position is a 1-year term, renewable for up to 3 years. Renewal will be based on progress, which includes scientific presentation/publication and continuation of funding. Salary is commensurate with qualifications and experience according to UBC guidelines. Candidates graduated from Food Microbiology or Microbiology possessing a strong publication record and excellent academic credentials are encouraged to apply. Applicants should send their curriculum vitae, names and full contact information for three references, and a cover letter. The cover letter should detail previous efforts relating to their molecular biology expertise and experience with foodborne pathogens.
    Please submit applications electronically to Dr. Kevin Allen. Note, UBC hires on the basis of merit and is committed to employment equity. Employment requires previous completion of a doctoral degree.
    Application submission address: kevin.allen@ubc.ca Competition closing date:
    Until filled Webaddress: http://www.landfood.ubc.ca/faculty-members/kevin-allen
     

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  • Listeria-laden cheese from Austria kills 8, human error suspected

    Posted: March 1st, 2010 - 9:20am by Doug Powell

    Austria's Linz-based company Prolactal said Sunday contamination of its cheese which caused eight people to die from listeriosis was due to human error during the manufacturing process.

    In November 2009, preservatives supposed to prevent the development of listeria in cheese were accidentally replaced twice "by cultures that do not give enough protection", the company said in a statement.

    The cheese was recalled on January 23. Eight have died in Austria and Germany from eating the contaminated dairy product.

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  • Food safety audits never enough

    Posted: March 1st, 2010 - 8:20am by Doug Powell

    “Know your suppliers. An audit does not make up for lack of knowledge of a supplier.”

    So said Bob Whitaker, chief science officer for the Newark, Del.-based Produce Marketing Association, at the Winning at Retail conference last week.

    Or as Mansour Samadpour of Seattle says,



    “The contributions of third-party audits to food safety is the same as the contribution of mail-order diploma mills to education.”

    Which is why every time some group like organic growers proclaims to be validated by third-party audits as a sign of superior product, I sigh. Have they not heard of the third-party audits done at Peanut Corporation of America which found the plant produced superior peanut paste – so superior that some 700 people got sick, nine died and over 4,000 products had to be recalled because of Salmonella flourished in the crappy production plant?

    Guess that didn’t come up in a recent survey announced by press release and uncritically repeated by others.

    A study being conducted by Michigan State University (MSU) on behalf of DNV finds that U.S. consumers are highly aware of food safety issues and they have high recognition of third party certification as an effective signal of food safety assurance. The consumers strongly prefer to see products labeled as safety certified. … US consumers say they want to see evidence on product labels that the food they are buying has passed some kind of independent safety certification process. Moreover, slightly more than one third of consumers indicate a willingness to pay a premium, upwards of 30 percent more.

    Food safety surveys along with hypothetical willingness-to-pay studies are crap: people overestimate their own food safety behaviors and vote at the supermarket checkout counter with their wallets.

    The vast number of facilities and suppliers means audits are required, but people have been replaced by paper. Audits, inspections, training and systems are no substitute for developing a strong food safety culture, farm-to-fork, and marketing food safety directly to consumers rather than the local/natural/organic hucksterism is a way to further reinforce the food safety culture.

    Whitaker also challenged the conventional wisdom that a high audit score — especially on an announced audit — is indicative of an all-is-well food safety program.

    He said it’s obvious when a company cleans up in preparation for an audit.

    “Unfortunately, I think in this industry we’ve gotten pretty good at dressing up and taking audits.”

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