Food Protection Trends - January/February 2021 - 139

suggested that perhaps the roundtable that was pulled from this year's
meeting, could be " repurposed " as a webinar, sponsored by our PDG - to
which the organizer Amy Simonne said she would take the idea back to
the team to consider.
Election of new PDG Vice Chair will need to take place before next
PDG meeting. PDG members were asked to please send in your nominations to Ian or DeAnn for consideration (self-nomination is acceptable).
Ian will post the request for nominations and closing date for submission
on IAFP Connect site AFTER the 10 November (the 2021 proposals submission due date), and a poll will be initiated shortly thereafter.
Journal of Food Protection wants to publish more regular reviews
and has produced a list of topics. Some of these planned reviews
have been assigned and are in preparation and some are still potential
reviews. Two questions were posed by Ian to the PDG: Do we have any
other suggestions for review topics? Do we know of someone who would
be willing to prepare the reviews that are currently listed as potential
reviews? Ian will post this request on IAFP Connect to gather response.
Five presenters provided different perspectives on the topic of
Covid-19 & safe food supplies around the world:
Peter Ben Embarek - WHO and Food Safety: In April, WHO /FAO
developed and published guidance documents (available online) for food
businesses and for food safety authorities, to address the concerns being
experienced. These guidance documents focused on risk-based food inspection, stress and changes for food laboratories and risk to the integrity
of the food chain (food fraud). More guidance documents are underway
to address management of traditional food markets during the COVID-19
pandemic and reducing public health risks associated with the sale of live
wild animals in traditional food markets. Peter provided a high-level overview of a project between WHO/FAO/OIE to develop a joint research and
development project (R&DBlueprint), go to https://www.who.int/teams/
blueprint/covid-19 on a series of topics around COVID-19 and the impact
on public health (vaccine) and the animal-human interface and issues
around transmission.
Don Schaffner - Science and Risk of COVID-19: Don has spent
much of the last 6 months speaking with the media (TV, print media,
radio, podcast, social media, etc.) about COVID-19, discussing risks and
risk mitigations. He narrated discussions he has had with people via Twitter - which mirror the discussions he has experienced in all media outlets
covering: Soap - it will not " pop " viruses. Lysol your takeout food - if it
makes you " feel " better, do it, but there is no science that supports doing
this (and there have been spikes at poison control centers due to toxic
reactions). Use soap to wash your produce - no! The material safety data
sheets for these soaps say no, they can make you sick. Groceries: There
was a YouTube video of aseptic technique for sanitizing groceries by a
doctor wearing scrubs (so it must be true?). No wash your hands when
you get home, but other precautions aren't scientifically warranted. Don
suggested this website for good information about food risk, go to https://
mia.co.nz/covid-19-response/effectiveness-of-ppe-nzfssrc/potential-forfoodborne-transmission-covid-19. There is very little supportive evidence
regarding contacting COVID-19 from fomites (inanimate objects).
Ashley Peterson - Keep Poultry Plants Operating: Beginning in
March a change in food habits occurred when people began eating more
food and protein (meat) at home, versus outside the home. Product that
was packaged and labelled for retail, was rerouted and sold for home
use to try meet demand. There was a lot of hoarding at first, with " truck
sales " selling meat out of trucks with people waiting in line for hours to be
able to get access to poultry product. The number of employees working
per 1000 sq ft of space in meat processing facilities is MUCH higher than
most other manufacturing industries. The meat industry collaborated on
ideas to keep employees safe. CDC and OSHA interim guidance for Meat
& Poultry Processing Workers & Employees released in April was very
helpful and the industry is now planning discussions to update this guidance based on all that has been learned since. Ashley shared a National
Chicken Council video, go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKRX0FLY2-k&feature=youtu.be outlining how the chicken industry has
enhanced safety measures in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Sammy Godefroy - Activities in MEA: MEA relies heavily on import of
foods and regulatory agencies are very stringent, but not necessarily risk
based. Some of the main food regulatory functions during the pandemic
included: addressing emerging risks; determining the risk is not a food
safety risk, but rather a food security risk; and maintaining the integrity of
food regulatory functions. Three key concerns/actions were identified:
(1) Risk communication: to review scientific information and issue scientific opinions tailored to audiences and deliver in the several languages (FAO/WHO INFOSAN guidance was helpful - Arabic, English and

French).Go to go to http://www.fao.org/policy-support/coronavirus-pandemic/en/. 2) Maintain food safety and supply by creating guidance
(based on WHO/FAO guidance) to help the food production sector adapt
and prevent / mitigate interruption in food production. 3) Maintain integrity
of Food regulatory functions. Countries maintaining things as usual, were
now forced to focus on risk-based thinking, interventions and learned how
to use and rely on technology (distance inspection, digitalization)
Tim Ryan - International Trade Implications: The meat trade market
was already complicated pre-COVID-19, with a sharp rise in China meat
imports in 2019, disruptions in trade policies and trade wars. Disruption to
supply chains, channel and trade occurred as COVID hit and work forces
were impacted. causing production of U.S. beef to drop drastically. Animals have " life cycles " that define their use for food production, so many
animals had to be euthanized. Marketing channels were also strongly
affected: hotel/restaurant use of meat drastically dropped as meat sales
shifted to retail meat purchases. Disruption to trade via extra inspection
services due to COVID-19, and when a COVID case is found in an
employee in a plant, shipments are suspended for export. Tim provided
some comments about how COVID will shape trade policy: recession
leading to reduced budgets to drive policies; global multilateralism becoming weaker as a result; evaluation of global supply chains, with global
air and sea freight in a state of flux; and countries beginning to promote
more self-sufficiency vs relying on imports (leading to food security issues
for some countries).
Recommendations to the Executive Board: None.
Next Meeting Date: July 17, 2021, Phoenix, Arizona.
Meeting Adjourned: 5:13 p.m. Eastern Time.
Chairperson: Ian Jenson.

Low Water Activity Foods PDG
Attendees: Abigail Snyder, April Bishop, Bhargavi Rane, Brad Taylor,
Bradley Marks, Brian Himelbloom, Chad Galer, Claudia Coronel, Don
Schaffner, Edith Wilkin, Elizabeth Grasso-Kelley, Francisco Diez-Gonzalez,
Francisco Garces-Vega, Fred Cook, Gale Prince, Gerardo Morantes,
Hudaa Neetoo, Ian Hildebrandt, James Dickson, Jeff Kornacki, Jena
Roberts, Jiin Jung, Joelle Salazar, Joseph Meyer, Judy Fraser-Heaps,
Juliany Rivera Calo, Kaylan Hayman, Kent Juliot, Laure Pujol, Larry
R. Beuchat, Larry Steenson, Lisa Lucore, Liz Palmer, Lukas Acanfora,
Margarita Gomez, Mary Choate, Mary Gillespie, Matt Igo, Michele
Gorman, Morgan Maite, Nate Anderson, Neil Bogart, Pamela Wilger,
Phil Steinbrunner, Pierre Olivier Beal, Quincy Suehr, Rajat Sharma,
Rachel Streufert, Ricky Falkenberg, Sakshi Lamba, Sanghyup Jeong,
Sofia Santillana Farakos, Stephanie Nguyen, Stephen Grove, Tim
Stubbs, Timothy Adams, Tom Black, Xiyang Liu, Yige Bima, Yuhuan
Chen, Yvonne Masters, and Sue (no last name given).
Board/Staff Present: Michelle D. Danyluk, Didi Loynachan, and Dina
Siedenburg.
Number of Attendees: 65.
Meeting Called to Order: 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Tuesday, September
22, 2020.
Minutes Recording Secretary: Bradley Marks, Vice Chair.
Old Business: Minutes of the 2019 PDG Meeting (July 1, 2019) were
approved (Motion: Pam Wilger. Second: Edith Wilkins) by unanimous
consent
New Business: Brief updates were provided by Matt Igo from the Student
PDG and Michelle Danyluk of the Executive Board.
Presentations were provided by student member Matt Igo (Rutgers
University) on Understanding the Survival of Foodborne Pathogens in
Low Water Activity Foods Using Mathematical Modeling and by Chad
Galer (Dairy Management, Inc.) on Best Practices to Manage Pathogens
in a Dry Dairy Food Facility.
Symposia/Roundtable/Workshop ideas were discussed in the whole
group meeting, based on input that was collected in advance of the
meeting (14 initial ideas). The ideas were distilled down into four topics
for further work at the end of this meeting, which occurred in topic-specific
breakout Zoom meetings. Details of the ideas refined during those smallgroup discussions were collected real-time via a shared Google Sheet
for collective coordination across the PDG, in advance of submission to
the IAFP system. Broad topics included sanitation and the environment
including clean breaks; process validation, surrogates, and emerging
topics.

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http://www.fao.org/policy-support/coronavirus-pan-demic/en/. 2 http://www.fao.org/policy-support/coronavirus-pan-demic/en/. 2 https://www.who.int/teams/blueprint/covid-19 https://www.who.int/teams/blueprint/covid-19 https://mia.co.nz/covid-19-response/effectiveness-of-ppe-nzfssrc/potential-for-foodborne-transmission-covid-19 https://mia.co.nz/covid-19-response/effectiveness-of-ppe-nzfssrc/potential-for-foodborne-transmission-covid-19 https://mia.co.nz/covid-19-response/effectiveness-of-ppe-nzfssrc/potential-for-foodborne-transmission-covid-19 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKRX-0FLY2-k&feature=youtu.be https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKRX-0FLY2-k&feature=youtu.be

Food Protection Trends - January/February 2021

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