Billy Joe Gregg Jr. – a man with not two but three first names and of course, it’s Billy Joe – an Ohio dairy farm worker has been charged with 12 counts of cruelty to animals after a welfare group released a video it says shows him and others beating cows with crowbars and pitchforks. He’s in jail, pondering his 15 minutes of fame.

KTVU reports a Lucky’s grocery store in San Ramon, California, apologized Sunday for selling bags of almonds that contained live and dead insects. After receiving a call from two customers saying they had bought a bag of almonds from the store and found live moths inside the bags, KTVU decided to check it out.

A new bill that overhauls the outdated Food Act 1981 was introduced to Parliament today. Food Safety Minister Kate Wilkinson said the current regulatory system was not as effective or efficient as it could be. "We have recently seen regional inconsistencies in how councils apply the current law, which will be addressed," she said.

The Butte County Public Health Department reports that since May 14 there have been seven confirmed cases of Salmonella of which three have been hospitalized. The average age of the seven cases is 29 years. In a typical year there are 32 cases of Salmonella reported in all of Butte County Mark Lundberg, M.D., Health Officer at Butte County Public Health, said,

A 35-year-old woman died and over 148 new cases of food poisoning were reported in Jhalod taluka of Dahod district on Tuesday. This has taken the total number of affected people to 269 with four dead. A day earlier, three children had died and 121 people had fallen sick after eating stale food at different wedding parties.

MANHATTAN -- After mounds of paperwork and months of preparation, Kansas State University's Biosecurity Research Institute has been approved to conduct research projects using several dangerous agents.

According to a survey by OIE, the high pathogenic H5N1 virus is detected in eight countries this spring. In Egypt for example, 34 infections were detected from April 1 to May 15. These infections were found at eight poultry farms of which six farms used vaccination against avian influenza.

A Montreal study finds heterotrophic bacteria counts, in more than 70 percent of bottled water samples, exceed the recommended limits specified by the United States Pharmacopeia (USP). Researchers from Ccrest laboratories report their results today at the 110th General Meeting of the American Society for Microbiology in San Diego.

WASHINGTON -– The U.S. Department of Agriculture today released a preliminary study revealing existing gaps in the regional food systems regarding the availability of slaughter facilities to small meat and poultry producers. The study by USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is a first attempt to identify areas in the U.S.