|
MSU
Dining Hall Closed Thanks to Another Food Poisoning Outbreak Source of
Article: http://www.newsinferno.com/archives/5424 Date Published: Thursday, April 2nd, 2009 Michigan
State University (MSU) is again facing a food poisoning
outbreak, this time, indefinitely closing a campus dining hall, reported
the Detroit News. This fall, MSU was hit with an E. coli outbreak believed
linked to Aunt Mid’s lettuce. Now,
health officials are reporting that over 50 people have been stricken with a
stomach illness, which was followed by an investigation by the county health
department, said Detroit News. “We have a number of students who became ill
in a short period of time,” said Dr. Dean Sienko, head of the Ingham County
Health Department. “That’s an outbreak,” he noted, according to Detroit
News. The
illness started being reported at about 2:00 a.m. yesterday with about 28
students reporting symptoms that include diarrhea, vomiting, nausea, and
stomach pain and who were treated at a local hospital, said the Detroit News;
16 remained hospitalized as of last night. Approximately 30 other students
were treated at the student health center, said Detroit News, which noted
that most of the ill students live at MSU’s Shaw Hall. The
source of the illness and the type of illness remain unknown; however, the
college believes the sickness to be food borne. According to Dr. Sienko, the
current outbreak appears to be different from this September’s E. coli
outbreak, “We are early in the investigation…. People want us to have
answers, and these things just take time,” quoted the Detroit News. Dozens
of cases of E. coli, all containing the same genetic fingerprint, were
reported in the earlier outbreak, which appeared to initiate at MSU, spread
to a variety of states, and was linked to contaminated lettuce from large
commercial bags sold by Aunt Mid’s. Twenty-one people were hospitalized, with
one developing HUS, or hemolytic uremic syndrome, a type of kidney failure
linked to food poisoning. The
Michigan Department of Agriculture conducted product and environmental sample
testing at Aunt Mid’s, with additional testing conducted by the state health
department, MSU, the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and Aunt
Mid’s. The tests all came back negative because, according to state health
officials, lettuce from the outbreak was not available at the time of the
testing. But, once the contaminated lettuce was identified by authorities and
was no longer available—and despite Aunt Mid’s claims its lettuce was not the
source—the outbreak stopped. E.
coli is the leading cause of food-borne illness in the U.S. and accounts for
about 73,000 infections and 61 death. And, now, there is growing concern in
the scientific community—not just because of the seeming prevalence of all
manner of food borne illnesses—but because instances of drug resistant E.
coli are being reported world-wide. Many
other food borne-related gastrointestinal illnesses have made headlines
recently. For instance, a number of salmonella outbreaks have been reported
nationwide in recent weeks and days with the largest being the historic
outbreak linked to Peanut Corporation of America (PCA) peanuts and peanut
products and an emerging and growing outbreak linked to Setton Pistachios.
The salmonella pathogen was to blame for an outbreak linked to SunSprout
Enterprises sprouts distributed by CW Sprouts. Tainted spices from the Union
International Food Company, “Kroger Lite Mayo” and other foods have also been
blamed for salmonella outbreaks. Also,
Norovirus recently shut down Massachusetts’ Babson College, and in an
unrelated incident, prompted an oyster recall in the Mississippi area. |
Copyright (C) All rights reserved under FoodHACCP.com
If you have any comments, please send your email to
info@foodhaccp.com
