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 "The picture is mixed," said Dr. Patricia Griffin of the U.S.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's division of foodborne
diseases, adding, "Most of it is not good news."
Despite making progress in certain areas, U.S. health officials have
made no progress in curbing overall rates of Salmonella and
Campylobacter - two pathogens that cause the highest number of
illnesses in people.
To see improvement on those two, "we're going to have to see some
widespread changes in the meat or poultry industry, so that the
reservoirs for these organisms are less contaminated," Griffin said,
commenting on the report issued on Thursday.
Dr. David Goldman of U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety
and Inspection Service said the agency has
proposed new pathogen reduction performance standards for two
problem pathogens in poultry - Salmonella and Campylobacter.
The new rules affect chicken parts and "comminuted" chicken and
turkey - poultry that has been mechanically deboned and chopped up
into smaller parts.
"We estimate within two years, these standards should prevent an
estimated 50,0000 cases of Salmonella and Campylobacter annually,"
Goldman said on a teleconference.
Goldman also said his agency has issued a final rule requiring the
clear labeling of mechanically tenderized beef products, as well as
detailed cooking instructions, an action he said USDA "hopes will
prevent hundreds E. coli illnesses every year."
The CDC's report is based on data collected from agency's FoodNet
surveillance system, which tracks nine pathogens in 10 U.S. states.
In the report, cases of laboratory-confirmed Shiga toxin-producing
E. coli 0157, which can sometimes lead to kidney failure, fell by 32
percent, compared with 2006-2008 and 19 percent when compared with
the most recent three years. These infections are often linked to
consumption of undercooked ground beef and raw leafy vegetables.
Salmonella Typhimurium, which has been linked to poultry, beef, and
other foods, fell by 27 percent compared with 2006-2008, continuing
a downward trend begun in the mid-1980s.
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But the incidence of Campylobacter, Vibrio and two less common types
of Salmonella - Javiana and Infantis - rose during the same period.
When all Salmonella serotypes are combined, there was no change in
2014.
"The data released today provide encouragement, but still tell us
the road is long," said Dr. Kathleen Gensheimer of the U.S. Food and
Drug Administration's Coordinated Outbreak Response and Evaluation
Team.
Gensheimer said FDA is on schedule to issue final rules late this
summer for the Food Safety Modernization Act, a sweeping package of
food safety reforms. Among the areas to be covered are produce
safety, preventive controls for food produced in facilities, and the
safety of imported food, she said.
Overall in 2014, FoodNet logged just over 19,000 infections, about
4,400 hospitalizations, and 71 deaths from the nine foodborne germs
it tracks. Salmonella and Campylobacter were by far the most common–
accounting for about 14,000 of the 19,000 infections reported.
The real number of infections is likely much larger, however,
because many people with foodborne infections are never tested.
Griffin estimates that for every person with a lab-confirmed case of
Salmonella, for example, there are about 29 other people who also
had the infection but were not tested.
(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen; Editing by Frances Kerry)
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