Picture Source: The Supermarket & Retailer March 2018
In 1998 the Sara Lee Corporation’s Bill Mar frankfurter factory in Zeeland Michigan was found to have dispatched product infected with Listeriosis.
There were 14 confirmed deaths and 4 miscarriages in 22 states.
Because of the flu like symptoms and time lapse between eating the infected product and obvious sickness, it was not easy to confirm the Bill Mar factory as the primary source. As in the South African outbreak, the infection appears to have occurred after processing in the packing department where a malfunctioning refrigeration evaporator was identified as the culprit.
It just shows how careful everyone must be with the processing and distribution of ready to eat processed foods and how independent health checks of food processing plants on a regular basis are critical to the maintenance of the necessary standards to prevent a recurrence.
We print a recent article on the South African outbreak which originally appeared in the Supermarket and Retailer magazine.
Read it here: “Listeriosis Outbreak in South Africa”
[gravityform id=”5″ title=”true” description=”true”]
Read more: Why is your cold store floor rising?
Read more: How to choose the right storage system
Read more: Cold Stores for Africa