Meat + Poultry - September 2010 - 101

CONTROLLING E. COLI

treatment of acidified sodium chlorite
while it is exposed to U.V., which has
yielded positive results. After using
the system for about a year, Marsden
says the company has realized significant success in controlling E. coli over
a long production period and he will
outline some of those improvements
during his presentation.

The Wal-Mart factor
Because Wal-Mart announced new
pathogen-reduction requirements for
its ground-beef suppliers earlier this
year, Marsden anticipates many attendees will be interested in his comments
on the initiative. Before announcing
its more-stringent requirements, WalMart food-safety officials first contacted Marsden to ask him if their expecta-

"Once it soaked in
exactly what it was
they were looking
for, especially on
the slaughter side,
companies like Tyson,
Cargill and JBS were
already in compliance."
tions were reasonable. His opinion was
noted and verified by the company's
suppliers, he says.
Requiring grinding operations to
be able to achieve a 2-log reduction,
he says, was first met with some angst
in the industry. However, "I'm going
to explain how relatively easy it is to
get that 2-log reduction," pointing out
that companies like Jensen Meat Co.
have successfully operated with this
capability using Sonova spray treatments for several years. "And now
other technologies are emerging that
allow you to get that 2-log reduction
with a minimal investment," he says.
Marsden will also address technologies available, including some
that address Wal-Mart's requiring
slaughtering operations to be able
to document a 5-log reduction. His
presentation will highlight a number
of technologies that can be used as a

DuPont Qualicon's Bax System relies on a real-time assay and a one-stage enrichment
to provide processors same-day results accurately for "real-world sample sizes of raw
ground beef and beef trim." (Photo courtesy of DuPont)

multiple-hurdle approach to achieving
that goal. One point that needs to be
made relating to Wal-Mart's requirement is that slaughtering operations
are requiring a "theoretical 5-log reduction," to accommodate cattle arriving at plants clean. If an animal
arrives at the plant and doesn't have
5 logs to remove, Wal-Mart doesn't
require achieving that reduction.
"They are saying if there are 5 logs
or more, your process should eliminate that," Marsden says. "It's not that
you have to have that reduction documented in the plant day in and day
out. It just means that your process is
capable of delivering that reduction."
While the announcement by the
retailer made many headlines initially,
Marsden says he has heard no grumbling about the requirements among
processors once they understood the
specifics. "Once it soaked in exactly
what it was they were looking for, especially on the slaughter side, companies
like Tyson, Cargill and JBS were already in compliance. On the processing
side, I think it's just a matter of making
some adjustments in the process and
getting in compliance pretty easily."

Pre-harvest approach
Controlling E. coli using pre-harvest
interventions is the focus of another

80 * Meat&Poultry * September 2010 * www.MeatPoultry.com

presentation at the NAMP event. Dr.
Guy Loneragan, professor of food safety and public health in the department
of animal and food sciences at Texas
Tech Univ., Lubbock, will provide an
update of current technologies available at the pre-harvest level to control
E. coli O157:H7
as well as reviewing promising technologies that will
become available soon. He
points out that
the pre-harvest
Loneragan
technology applications are not limited to beef production operations, but are applicable
to treating dairy cattle as well.
Technologies applied prior to
slaughter typically fall into one of
three segments, according to Loneragan, including: biological control
(including probiotic- and bacteriophage-based interventions); vaccine
control; and chemical control/feed
additives, including sodium chlorate
"and another product that we'll discuss at the conference."
"I'll also get into how these technologies contribute to an overall multihurdle approach to food safety," he
says. Future needs and contributions

http://www.MeatPoultry.com

Meat + Poultry - September 2010

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Meat + Poultry - September 2010