Food poisoning burden-Staggering cost for suffering from food borne infections

Improperly stored and processed foods can cause many diseases, some of them being fatal to humans. Food industry is expected to take highest precaution in handling foods intended for the market to avoid delivery of tainted foods with serious consequences and it must be said that most processors do a reasonably good job in ensuring consumer protection investing heavily in preventive practices to stop release of suspected products in the market. Unfortunately some undesirable practices and the diverse sources from where food ingredients are sourced from different parts of the world make it difficult to avoid occasional hiccups in the form of food illness among a small group of consumers. Traceability of contamination across the food supply chain is now a priority with the industry and if a fool proof system is evolved even when food contamination is detected the source from where it emanated can be ascertained for restricting the damage to the minimum. Excellent ,fast, and reliable techniques for testing food contaminants have further enabled the industry to take maximum care to ensure food safety. In the US where reliable system of documentation of food contamination incidences exists, the consequences in terms of economic damage to the country due to food pathogens are well illustrated as seen below: 

"Salmonella causes an estimated $3.7 billion each year in medical costs for Americans, according to the latest estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service. That figure places Salmonella at the top of the rankings for the15 most costly foodborne illnesses. USDA says it regularly updates its cost estimates for food borne pathogens to keep policy makers and the public informed about the relative impact of food borne illness.The top 15 foodborne pathogens account for 95 percent of illnesses and deaths related to food in the U.S.

The 15 costliest foodborne pathogens are as follows:
    1. Salmonella – $3.7 billion; 1,027,561 total cases; 19,336 hospitalized; 378 deaths
    2. Toxoplasma gondii – $3.3 billion; 86,686 cases; 4,428 hospitalized; 343 deaths
    3. Listeria monocytogenes – $2.8 billion; 1,591 cases; 1,173 hospitalized; 306 deaths
    4. Norovirus – $2.3 billion; 5,461,731 cases; 14,663 hospitalized; 149 deaths
    5. Campylobacter – $1.9 billion; 845,024 cases; 8,463 hospitalized; 76 deaths
    6. Clostridium perfringens – $343 million; 965,958 cases; 438 hospitalized; 26 deaths
    7. Vibrio vulnificus - $320 million; 96 cases; 93 hospitalized; 36 deaths
    8. Yersinia enterocolitica - $278 million; 97,656 cases; 480 hospitalized; 29 deaths
    9. E. coli O157 – $271 million; 63,153 cases; 2,138 hospitalized; 30 deaths
    10. Vibrio (all other non-cholera species) - 17,564 cases; 83 hospitalized; 8 deaths
    11. Shigella – $138 million; 131,254 cases; 1,456 hospitalized; 10 deaths
    12. Cryptosporidium – $52 million; 57,616 cases; 210 hospitalized; 4 deaths
    13. Vibrio parahaemolyticus – $41 million; 34,664 cases; 100 hospitalized; 4 deaths
    14. E. coli non-O157 – $27 million; 112,752 cases; 271 hospitalized; 1 death
    15. Cyclospora – $2 million; 11,407 cases; 11 hospitalized; zero deaths

Deaths accounted for the greatest costs incurred from food poisoning. For example, the 378 deaths attributed to Salmonella accounted for 89 percent of the total cost associated with the pathogen, despite Salmonella's 0.04-percent death rate. Other costs incurred can include medical costs, time away from work, and the societal willingness to pay to prevent deaths, USDA said. "Cost estimates of food borne illnesses have been used in the past to help inform food-safety policy discussions," the agency noted, "and these updated cost estimates will provide a foundation for economic analysis of food safety policy."

Why such colossal damage happens only in the US is some what puzzling but one can get a clue when the reporting systems regarding food safety incidences elsewhere in the world is examined. In most developing countries there is very little data base to look at when any comparison is to be drawn with the record of the US in safety vigilance. In most of the developed countries there is reliable data base though they may not be as meticulous as that practiced in the US. Probably WHO of the UN can help those countries not having data recording system vis-a-vis food poisoning to set up the same with a little bit of economic and technical help which will go a long way in tackling food related diseases through scientific surveillance and rapid response regime.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

FOOD BORN PATHOGENS-NEW TOOL TO DETECT THE SOURCE

Human efforts in protecting foods from the predatory microbiological pathogens is an ongoing fight ever since the dawn of civilization and the fact that there are still many pathogens lurking around without getting annihilated speaks volume about their sagacity, perseverance and adaptability. In spite of most sophisticated detection technologies and space age electronic instruments to track them, pathogens seem to be one step ahead of humans in infecting foods and spreading diseases. Whether it is meat contamination with Salmonella or other food poisoning out breaks, the experience has shown that it requires long time in tracing the source of contamination and take ameliorative actions. Precious human lives can be saved if the time lapse between detection and tracing is shortened. This seems to the be aim of efforts by a new public-private collaborative partnership that has been recently launched where genomic sequences of 100,000 food associated bacterial species are sought to be mapped over a five year period that is expected to help identifying the type of contamination immediately once it is detected. Here are further details of this public data base creating program that will allow food safety officials access the data freely on line.

"The Food and Drug Administration is teaming up with the University of California, Davis to pinpoint the genetic codes of 100,000 types of lethal food-borne bacteria so the agency can more quickly stop deadly contamination outbreaks. A batch of food-safety incidents have hit the U.S. recently. Last year, 25 people died from listeria contamination in Colorado-grown cantaloupes. About 100 people were sickened earlier this year due to salmonella tied to raw tuna in sushi. The FDA will collaborate with the university, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and chemical analysis/engineering company Agilent Technologies Inc.,A -1.03% of Santa Clara, Calif., to sequence the genomes of the bacterial types and subtypes. They then will post the complex genetic codes in a public database maintained by the National Institutes of Health's National Center for Biotechnology Information. Steven Musser, director of the FDA's office of regulatory science for food safety, said the novel venture will be akin to the DNA information compiled by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for investigating crimes. "Right now, we spend a lot of time after an outbreak trying to figure out what country is it from, and how is it spreading," said Dr. Musser. He said such gene sequencing could have been helpful in the investigating this year's salmonella outbreak in tuna, which originated from a plant in India, the FDA concluded after investigating. "If you don't have a DNA database for these bacteria, you're working largely blind," said Paul Zavitsanos, Agilent's world-wide food-safety manager. "You've got to know what variant of bacteria you're dealing with." So, in the case of the tuna in sushi, Mr. Zavitsanos said it would be possible, with such a database, to know quickly that the salmonella variant causing illnesses came from fish and "you'd probably know geographically where it was centered on the planet." Armed with that information, he said, federal authorities could quickly shut down ports of entry for that type of fish and minimize the spread of illness. "If we had this genetic sequence already, we could know immediately that the salmonella probably came from India, and we could have responded much more quickly," said Dr. Musser. In that instance, it took nearly two months for the agency to confirm that sushi was to blame in the outbreak that is believed to have begun in February. He said having this extensive pathogen database also will speed up the process through which the CDC confirms that illnesses are linked, and that an outbreak is even taking place. The FDA said the new database can lead to tests that have the potential to significantly reduce the typical public-health response time in outbreaks of food-borne illness to days instead of weeks. The venture, which will be termed The 100K Genome Project, will be a five-year effort to discern the genetic codes of subtypes of important pathogens like salmonella, listeria and E. coli, all responsible for widespread outbreaks from a range of food products in recent years. The Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service, which inspects meat in the U.S., also will cooperate in the effort. The actual sequencing will occur largely at a newly formed genome sequencing facility at UC Davis".

The free database that will be set up at the University of California, Davis, will enable scientists to pinpoint not only what food carries the bacteria responsible for a given outbreak but also what country it came from. Such outbreaks generally take weeks to solve but the new database after it is created, is expected to reduce that to a matter of a few days. So far scientists have been able to identify as many as 3,000 sequences out of which only about 1,000 are related to food. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the US has the largest such database but the gene maps it contains are only partial, not enough to determine which food the illness came from or its geographic origin. Cataloging gene codes is time-consuming and expensive. For example Salmonella alone has about 2,700 different strains, almost three times as many as all the sequences for food-borne bacteria that have been cataloged to date. When the project is completed in 5 years time, it may hopefully herald a new era for human beings to live without any serious fear of food borne infection dangers lurking among them.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

RAW MILK CONSUMPTION-THE "SAFETY" DEBATE

Why should the milk undergo the routine thermal processing involving heating to 161F for 15 seconds or any other heat treatment before marketing? Any school going kid will answer this question as every one knows it is a highly perishable commodity incapable of keeping in good quality even for a day without getting spoiled and becoming unfit for human consumption. There are many bacteria in milk by the time it is extracted from the milch animal and as it is one of the richest sources of vital nutrients for growth of any living organism, it is no wonder these bacteria proliferate quickly causing chemical, physical and microbiological changes in the material. Why some people are defying this scientific truth and still advocate consumption of raw milk is puzzling. Most charitable explanation could be that such irrational practices arise out of ignorance prevailing among some people. According to knowledgeable scientists, nutritionists, health pundits and toxicologists, raw milk consumption has the potential to make people sick through contamination with pathogenic bacteria like Salmonella, virulent E.coli, Listeria, Campylobacter etc with undesirable consequences like fever, head ache, diarrhea, abdominal pain, vomiting besides other long term health problems. Here is a commentary on this queer phenomenon of a few people stubbornly campaigning against pasteurization process and encouraging consumption of only raw milk.       

"Earlier this year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control concluded a 13-year study and reported raw-milk products are 150 times more likely to cause foodborne illnesses than pasteurized dairy foods. In January, 81 people in four states developed intestinal infections from raw milk traced to a Franklin County dairy farm, according to the state Department of Health. They were sickened by campylobacter bacteria, which causes fever, diarrhea, vomiting and headaches. At least nine people were hospitalized. "The health issues are considerable," said James Dunn, Ph.D., an agricultural economist at Penn State University. "It doesn't have to be a big mistake to have a big implication. When you pasteurize milk, it kills the germs." Conventional milk is pasteurized in a process that typically heats milk to 161 degrees for 15 seconds to kill bacteria. Advocates of raw milk, though, say it can cure illnesses and protect against diseases. "Pasteurization is the greatest destruction of nutrients of anything we have in this country," said Sally Fallon Morrell, president of the Weston A. Price Foundation, a nutrition advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C. "Raw milk is an extremely nutrient-dense food." Unpasteurized milk helps protect against asthma, allergies and skin problems and builds strong teeth and bones, Ms. Morrell said.
"These things need to be looked at more," she said.

Some of the justifications touted by the protagonists of raw milk cannot stand scientific scrutiny and many of their claims are just outlandish. It is not correct to say that pasteurization destroys nutrients, creates lactose intolerance, causes allergy and kills active cells supposed to beneficial. Of course the argument that babies fed on breast milk thrive well is a perfectly valid one but it must be remembered that milk is directly transferred from the mother to the child without any out side intervention , thereby eliminating the chances of contamination of the ingested milk. In contrast commercial operations like milking, use of containers, milking environment, chilling, bulk transport, packing etc can cause havoc to the microbial quality of milk and only pasteurization process can stop this eventuality. The compulsions of modern life like ready access to milk 24x7, distribution time, retailing and storage in kitchen for consumption as and when needed all make it imperative to preserve the milk at least for a few days. Not only fluid milk but products made from raw milk including soft cheeses like Brie, Camembert, Queso Fresco, Panela, Asadero etc are also considered risky to consume, especially by vulnerable consumers like pregnant women, old people and those with weakened immune system. An interesting issue is that consumption of raw milk in the US has caused only less than 1000 milk related safety episodes since 1998 and therefore it would be better to leave those insisting on consuming raw milk to continue to do so, in stead of arguing the case against the practice.   

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

KITCHEN DANGERS-HOW TO PRE-EMPT THEM

It is true that many traditional kitchen practices, especially in middle class families, pose safety hazards but in most developing countries this risk is more than offset by severe heating all foods are subjected to before consumption. In contrast many developed countries have "safe" modern kitchens with high level of sanitation designed to protect the citizens from a multitude of diseases caused by pathogenic viruses and bacteria. Still careless practices by house wives can still endanger the lives of such families through serious infections. Predominant consumption of salads and animal derived food products only accentuate the problem. Only recently a warning has been issued in the US regarding the possibility of widespread Norovirus contamination for which guidelines have been issued by the Authorities concerned. Here is a list of precautions recommended for avoiding serious infection episodes at the house hold level.  

"Every year, 76 million Americans get sick from food, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Nothing you can do will ever guarantee 100 percent protection against food-borne illness, but taking certain precautions can help reduce your risk. Some of these protective steps are common sense, like washing your hands before you eat. Others aren't so obvious. Read on to discover five surprising sources of food-borne "bugs" in your kitchen that we've written about in EatingWell Magazine, and how to protect yourself."

Though the suggestions made look pedestrian bordering on being silly, they still deserve all the attention they deserve. It is advisable that every house hold takes special precaution to keep their kitchen place neat and tidy.
Refrigerator the most ubiquitous gadget without which modern life becomes unbearable is a veritable source of dangerous vectors and most house wives fail to keep it clean with frequent cleaning and disinfection practice. Though smart refrigerators are in the market with computer aided "management" capability, ultimately there is no substitute to human vigilance if any food related episodes are to be avoided.

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com