Campylobacter Watch

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Health Talk & You
Craig Hedberg, Ph.D.
The Pilot-Independent
Last Updated: Wednesday, July 06th, 2005 09:26:33 AM
It’s that time of year when we fire up the grill, dish out the potato salad, and cut up the fruit salad for festive summer picnics and barbeques. But nothing can spoil a rollicking warm-weather gathering like a food-borne illness.
While it’s a pleasure to eat outside, the risks for contracting food-borne illnesses are higher when you prepare and serve a meal out of doors.
There are several ways to make sure you don’t unwittingly infect yourself and your guests with dangerous illnesses like salmonella, E. coli and campylobacter. The first step is to wash your hands with soap and running water before preparing, serving or eating any food.Continue Reading Summer food safety tips

William D. Marler (www.williammarler.com), an attorney at Marler Clark LLP PS (http://www.marlerclark.com) has extensive experience representing victims of bacterial and viral food poisonings. Since 1993, Marler Clark has represented victims of most of the largest foodborne illness outbreaks in the United States, including the 1993 Jack in the Box E. coli, 1998 Odwalla E. coli,…

From the CDC
What is campylobacteriosis?
Campylobacteriosis is an infectious disease caused by bacteria of the genus Campylobacter. Most people who become ill with campylobacteriosis get diarrhea, cramping, abdominal pain, and fever within 2 to 5 days after exposure to the organism. The diarrhea may be bloody and can be accompanied by nausea and vomiting. The illness typically lasts 1 week. Some persons who are infected with Campylobacter don’t have any symptoms at all. In persons with compromised immune systems, Campylobacter occasionally spreads to the bloodstream and causes a serious life-threatening infection.Continue Reading Campylobacteriosis

Use a food thermometer to make sure food is safe
Most people think they can check the doneness of burgers, pork chops and chicken breasts just by “eyeballing it.” They look at it and judge the doneness by its appearance. They trust their experience. Experience is good, but it might be misleading.
According to a recent USDA study, one out of every four hamburgers turns brown in the middle before it has reached a safe internal temperature.
Eating undercooked meats or poultry increases the risk of food-borne illness. Many pathogens live naturally in the intestinal tracts of food animals.
Surveys of meat sold in retail food stores indicate that between one-fourth and three-fourths of all meat and poultry cuts sold in 1999 might have been contaminated with food-borne pathogens.
Bacteria most commonly associated with undercooked meats are campylobacter, salmonella and escherichia coli O157:H7.Continue Reading You can’t judge a burger by its color

By Carole Sugarman
My daughter never met a chicken tender she didn’t like. But during a recent family vacation in Florida, 9-year-old Anna was struck with a bad case of salmonellosis — disease caused by salmonella. And while we’ll never know for sure, we strongly suspect it was caused by contaminated, undercooked poultry at one of her daily restaurant chicken meals.
There is more than a little irony in this tale of excruciating stomach pains, bathroom vigils and hospital emergency rooms.
As a food writer for 25 years, I’ve interviewed numerous victims of food-borne diseases and parents of children who’ve died from them. I’ve attended scores of conferences and hearings where food safety issues are debated among government officials, industry and activist groups.
But this was the first time I got to see firsthand how devastating full-blown food-borne illness can be. Believe me, we’re not talking about a bad tummy ache.Continue Reading A Taste of Food Poisoning

www.about-campylobacter.com
Campylobacter jejuni (Pronounced “camp-e-low-back-ter j-june-eye”) was not recognized as a cause of human foodborne illness prior to 1975. Now, the bacterial organism is known to be the most common cause of bacterial foodborne illness in the U.S.1 (Salmonella is the second most common cause).
Most cases Campylobacter infection occur as isolated, sporadic events, not as a part of the large outbreaks. Even though surveillance is very limited, over 10,000 cases are reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) each year. Active surveillance for cases indicates that over 17 cases for each 100,000 persons in the population (or about 46,000 cases) are diagnosed yearly.1 Undoubtedly, many more cases go undiagnosed and unreported, and estimates are that Campylobacter causes 2-4 million cases per year in the United States.4Continue Reading What is Campylobacter jejuni?

Jun 27, 2005
The Children’s Zoo in Toledo was closed for the weekend after three animals tested positive for an infectious bacteria that causes gastrointestinal illness.
No patrons have reported being ill, but officials said Friday that the petting portion of the children’s zoo could remain closed for the rest of the summer.
“This is not a major public health hazard, we’re just being extremely, extremely cautious,” said Andrew Odum, chairman of the zoo’s biological programs committee.Continue Reading Animals Test Positive For Campylobacter

Jun 27, 2005
TOLEDO (AP) — The Children’s Zoo in Toledo was closed for the weekend after three animals tested positive for an infectious bacteria that causes gastrointestinal illness. No patrons have reported being ill, but officials said Friday that the petting portion of the children’s zoo could remain closed for the rest of the summer.
“This is not a major public health hazard, we’re just being extremely, extremely cautious,” said Andrew Odum, chairman of the zoo’s biological programs committee. The zoo is part of the much larger Toledo Zoo.Continue Reading Children’s Zoo Closed After Animals Test Positive for Bacteria

Saturday, June 25, 2005
Petting area may stay shut awhile
By TAD VEZNER
BLADE STAFF WRITER
The Children’s Zoo at the Toledo Zoo was shut down yesterday following the discovery of an infectious bacteria in several of its animals.
And zoo officials said last night that the petting portion of the children’s facility could remain closed for the rest of the summer.
Last week, two baby calves sharing the same stall tested positive during routine testing for a bacteria known as Campylobacter, a common cause of gastrointestinal illness. A sow that had just given birth in an adjacent stall also tested positive.Continue Reading Infectious bacteria in animals closes Children’s Zoo

Breaking News on Supplements & Nutrition in the USA
6/15/2005- New technology could soon make it cheap and easy to identify food pathogens by tagging them with color-coded probes made out of synthetic tree-shaped DNA.
These tiny “nanobarcodes” fluoresce under ultraviolet light in a combination of colors that can then be read by a computer scanner or observed with a fluorescent light microscope.
The Cornell University research group behind the project likens the technology to a supermarket checkout computer, capable of identifying thousands of different items by scanning barcodes.Continue Reading Color coded pathogens offer safer food formulation