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04 Aug 2011 14:54

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Biz: USDA knew about salmonella outbreak for two weeks

  • Officials knew that the infected ground turkey came from Cargill, inc. They just didn’t want to say anything because there was no way to know for sure. Cargill issued a voluntary recall yesterday, and the outbreak began in March. That’s kind of a long time — but with good reason. At first it was confusing to investigators because some people who didn’t eat the turkey would get sick, but when more cases of this particular strain of Salmonella became more widespread, an earnest investigation was started. Eventually it was traced back to Cargill, and the recall was issued — the third largest of its kind on record. Yikes. source

03 Aug 2011 20:23

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Biz: Latest salmonella outbreak forces recall of lots of freaking turkey

  • 36 million pounds of ground turkey; no word on how many giblets source
  • » One person killed, 76 sickened: Salmonella is no laughing matter, and Cargill is responding quickly to the crisis. “It is regrettable that people may have become ill from eating one of our ground turkey products and, for anyone who did, we are truly sorry,” said Steve Willardsen, who’s in charge of the company’s turkey-processing business. Ground turkey is particularly susceptible to salmonella contamination — at any given time, federal research says that 10 to 15 percent of all ground turkey is contaminated with salmonella. In the case of the Cargill outbreak, the meat was infected with a antibiotic-resistant variety called Salmonella Heidelberg. While cooking the meat at 165° F kills the salmonella, the problem arises when handling the meat, which can infect other foods nearby. Might want to be careful, carnivores.