Posts Tagged ‘ campylobacter ’

Contaminated Chicken â€“ Not a Paltry Affair

December 7th, 2009. By LucyC

chicken Contaminated Chicken â€“ Not a Paltry Affair Here’s some rather unappetizing news—just in time for the holiday season. The results of a study that will be published in the upcoming edition of Consumer Reports, were being floated around the Internet last week, results which show that two thirds of store bought chickens are contaminated with pathogens that could make you very ill.

Apparently we should be grateful for this statistic, because it is markedly better than that of two years ago when eight out of 10 chickens were found to be contaminated with bacteria, including salmonella and campylobacter. (Even the names sound awful.)

As most of us are no doubt aware by now given the seemingly endless number of food recalls, salmonella, campylobacter, E. coli, and Listeria monocytogenes, to name the more common pathogens, can make us seriously ill. Food poisoning is the collective and rather vague term for the litany of physical ailments that includes vomiting, diarrhea, kidney failure, paralysis, seizures, hearing and visual impairment, and mental retardation. Worse, people have been known to die from food poisoning. Goodness knows it sure feels like death is imminent when have it.

Back to the study. The folks at ConsumerReports.org hired an independent lab to test 382 chickens that were purchased in the spring from over 100 supermarkets. Those stores included Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: campylobacter, chicken, Food Illness, Salmonella
Posted in Emerging Issues, Food Illness | 2101No Comments »2009-12-07+19%3A16%3A52LucyC