Iowa City Press Citizen, IA
05-08-07
Food recalls put industry on alert
Restaurants, grocery stores watch supplies, make changes
By Rob Daniel
Iowa City Press-Citizen
Guy Williams is particular about the state of the kitchen he works in.
As kitchen manager at Rugger's Café in North Liberty, he spent part of an
afternoon preparing the evening meals for cooking. Taking a chunk of sirloin, he
sliced several eight-ounce steaks, eventually wrapping them in plastic wrap.
When he was finished, he washed his hands and the area before moving on to
another task.
"I can't work in a dirty kitchen," said Williams, the kitchen manager at Rugger's
Café in North Liberty. "I've got this habit to stop and clean."
The approach has helped Williams and his staff avoid food illness complaints in
the year it's been open. At the same time, reports of food safety concerns have
been finding their way into the news in recent years, starting with the mad cow
disease scare in 2003. In the past six months, there have been recalls because
of e.coli in spinach, salmonella linked to peanut butter and tainted pet food.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta estimates that 76
million people get sick, more than 300,000 are hospitalized and 5,000 Americans
die each year from food-borne illness, according to the agency's Web site. This is
despite the United States having one of the world's safest food supplies.
However, the frequency of major food-borne illnesses has declined during the
past 10 years, said Sam Beattie, an Iowa State University food safety
extension specialist. He said increased measures of analyzing foods for such
hazards as bacteria in the food industry -- all through the Hazard Analysis and
Critical Control Points Quality Assurance Programs -- has helped slow the
spread of tainted food to consumers.
"The food industry has taken a very proactive role in ensuring safe foods,"
Beattie said. "HACCP works."
The most common food illness has been norovirus, which occurs when someone
fails to wash fecal material from their hands and later contaminates food or
surfaces, Beattie said.
"The only source of norovirus is humans," he said. "Hand washing is the only
way to prevent it."
Mad cow disease was never a serious concern in the United States after meats
from infected countries, such as Great Britain and Canada, were banned from
import, Beattie said. In addition, he said CDC figures might be high, with the
number of people made ill from infected raw food, such as lettuce, coming to
about 900 per year out of 40 to 50 billion servings.
"I would say that is a pretty good record of safety, but it could be better and
research is needed to show how to make it better," Beattie said.
Area restaurants and grocery stores have watched their own supply as the
reports of food illnesses have come in, especially last fall when e.coli was found
in much of the nation's fresh spinach.
At the Brown Bottle in Iowa City and North Liberty, spinach concerns caused
quick changes to salads. The salads served with every meal involved a lettuce
blend containing spinach leaves, co-owner Gina Landau said. The restaurant
switched to iceberg lettuce after a tip from the Johnson County Public Health
department, Landau said.
"We had to switch in a matter of three hours," she said. "(Our suppliers are)
usually more than willing to pick stuff up. We are much more aware of it now."
Stores such as New Pioneer Food Co-op have taken a different approach,
working mainly with small producers in Iowa. Theresa Carbrey, education and
member services coordinator at New Pioneer, said the store works with only
organic foods, or those grown with no pesticides. Also, all meat sold at the store
comes from animals that were vegetarian fed. As part of the store's creed to
support local producers, most of the food comes from within an hour's drive of
Iowa City, she said.
"It's very helpful if you can look to your local supplier," Carbrey said. "We know
the person who's growing and it gives a great degree of confidence. Every time
we go farther away, we become more vulnerable."
Reach Rob Daniel at 339-7360 or rdaniel@press-citizen.com.
Source: Food and Drug Administration