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 The call to action comes amid multistate E. coli outbreaks involving
167,427 pounds (76,000 kg) of ground beef made by All American Meats
of Omaha, Nebraska, and the closing of 43 Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc
restaurants in Washington and Oregon. The outbreak is Chipotle's
third this year.
Just three germs - Salmonella, E. coli, and Listeria - cause 91
percent of outbreaks, contaminate widely distributed foods such as
vegetables, beef, chicken and fresh fruits, and end up sickening
people in many states, according to a new report by the U.S. Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention.
Top officials from the CDC were joined by the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture in issuing the
warning on Tuesday.
"Reacting to problems isn't sufficient in today's food system, nor
is it the best way to practice public health," Dr. Kathleen
Gensheimer, director of FDA's Coordinated Outbreak Response &
Evaluation Network, said in a teleconference.
Gensheimer stressed that in the past, food safety has been focused
on reacting to outbreaks, but new regulations set to take effect in
2016 will require companies to take a science-based approach to
building safety controls into food production.
"Industry is a very critical partner," she said.
For example, although it is still not clear what caused the E. Coli
outbreak at Chipotle, Gensheimer said on the call that the company
has shared "all of their records and is working with us in any way
possible to give us information about their suppliers."
Gensheimer also said after the current investigation ends, the
company expressed interest in meeting with FDA and the CDC to work
out ways to prevent future outbreaks.
CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said state-of-the-art disease tracking
tools, and the introduction of gene tools, are helping to quickly
track down the source of food-borne outbreaks in collaboration with
state and national partners.
Frieden said disease detectives are "cracking the cases much more
frequently than in past years because we have this new DNA
fingerprinting tool being used increasingly," but many cases still
go unsolved.
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He said companies are also stepping up to help, noting new
requirements at Wal-Mart Stores Inc for food suppliers that set new
control for suppliers to reduce contamination and the wholesaler's
Costco's use of membership card lists to notify customers about
recalled foods.
In recent months, the CDC, FDA and USDA have been trying to persuade
U.S. food companies to voluntarily submit the genetic sequences of
the pathogens they find in their food production plants to a
nationwide database that could be used to track down the source of
outbreaks earlier.
In the report, scientists analyzed CDC data on outbreaks from 2010
to 2014, comparing outbreaks that occurred in two or more states to
those that occurred in a single state.
They found that the 120 multistate outbreaks accounted for 11
percent of illnesses, 34 percent of hospitalizations and 56 percent
of deaths. An average of 24 multistate outbreaks occurred each year.
The report stressed the need for food industries to play a bigger
role in improving food safety by keeping detailed records to allow
for faster tracing of foods, using store loyalty cards to identify
which foods made people sick, and notifying customers of recalls.
(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen; editing by Bill Rigby and Andrew
Hay)
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