A wide recall of beef products potentially carrying E. coli bacteria originating in Canada is said to have hurt the reputation of the entire industry from farm to processor.
“Any food safety issue hurts us on the ground,” said Arnold Hanson, a cow-calf producer from Viking, Alta., and a delegate to the Alberta Beef Producers.
Government officials in Canada and the United States have been collaborating on a recall following an outbreak of E. coli, that resulted in a New Jersey processor, Topps Meat Co., going out of business after it received meat from a number of sources, including the now closed Ranchers’ Beef at Balzac, Alta.
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Canadian meat is already inspected at the processing plants, but the U.S. has implemented increased inspections looking for E. coli O157:H7, salmonella and listeria.
Hanson has faith the Canadian Food Inspection Agency can do a full trace to find the source of these contaminants when they occur. Even though this most recent problem did not likely start at the ranch level, no one wants damaged reputations from a food safety problem.
“We’re at the primary level but we still have to put our names on the line,” Hanson said. “Even if we are not on a food safety program, we do what we can to make the best product we can.”
The CFIA website at www.inspection.gc.ca has a complete list of products affected and stores that carried them. The agency warns people to get rid of any frozen products they have from this list.
No one has reported illness from eating these products.
The Japanese government recently ordered two Tokyo area meat importers to halt sales and recall beef imported from a Canadian processing plant discovered to have shipped meat containing the E. coli bacteria June 13. Most of the meat was already consumed and there have been no reports of illness in Japan.
At the Canadian Meat Council, manager Jim Laws said a positive E. coli test can happen to any processor even when it uses a food safety system like Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points that emphasizes steam pasteurization, sterilization of equipment and proper staff training.
“Work is ongoing all the time on new procedures and processes to reduce the E. coli,” Laws said. “Ranchers (Beef) had some pretty good interventions. It could happen to anybody. The more interventions you have in place, the better your chances of it not happening to you.”
For example, the National Meat Association representing U.S. packers reported Cargill Meat Solutions in Pennsylvania voluntarily recalled more than one million pounds of ground beef products produced between Oct. 8 and 11 because they might be contaminated with E. coli.
CFIA officials said this was not a particularly unusual year for E. coli cases, but it is working with the Public Health Agency on 45 cases that were diagnosed in New Brunswick, Quebec, Saskatchewan, Ontario and British Columbia. These cases were previously reported from July to September with 11 people hospitalized and one death.
The investigation determined most of the cases shared a unique genetic pattern of the bacteria and the cause of the illnesses has been mostly associated with ground beef. This new E. coli pattern has also been found in the U.S.
Major policy changes have been implemented because of the prevalence of E. coli in North America, said Tom Graham, CFIA’s national co-ordinator of the HACCP program.
Under Canadian law, federal plants must have mandatory, CFIA-approved HACCP programs to manage food safety.
“We audit these companies’ programs to make sure they have these in place,” Graham said.
