Here We Go Again?
Officials in Colorado claim to have tied some of their salmonella cases to PCA's Texas plant, reports the Oregonian.
The source was "grind it yourself" peanut butter from a health food store.
(Don't get me started on these in-store grinders, but if a food company of Kellogg's sophistication has a hard time checking up on suppliers, imagine how good your local health food store is about checking up on theirs. The same goes, in my mind, for all the bulk bins. Not to mention the "Who used this last?" issue. I say yuck.)
At least everybody who uses peanuts has their supplier lists already on their desks, so the cascade of downstream recalls will go faster.
The FDA Comes Calling
I've been away from blogging for a few days while responding to the PCA recall. The FDA inspector came in last Thursday to follow up and make sure that we didn't have any PCA product (we don't). The State of Michigan called Friday to do some additional follow up on the phone. The FDA inspector also looked over our little peanut butter plant. All three of our lines -- peanut butter, nut roasting, and confectionary -- are shut down for our annual maintenance and cleaning period, so he'll have to come back to watch the peanut butter run.
Lower Grade Peanuts = More Salmonella Danger?
Today's New York Times has a long front-page piece on the PCA recall. Little if anything new in the article, but I did find this little tidbit interesting:
“They had a little niche market, importing some peanuts from Mexico and South America, and buying a lower grade,” said Mr. Hall, who visited the plant when it clogged city sewers with oil overflows.
This goes back to a point I made earlier concerning the role that ruthless cost-cutting in the supply chain plays our growing food safety issues. The article also points out that Georgia's budgets for food inspections were under pressure. None of this excuses PCA, but we won't have consistently safe food unless the underlying money questions are solved.
Wrap up on Initial FDA Observations
In a series of posts I picked apart the FDA's observations of the PCA plant. Assuming that the FDA's report is accurate (which PCA disputes), what does this show?
The report indicates that PCA had repeated positive tests for salmonella in multiple products over a fairly long period of time. The FDA also had positive salmonella swab tests in the plant. While the FDA's observations contain serious violations of good manufacturing practices they don't, to my way of thinking, account for the repeated positive tests. In the ConAgra recall, investigation eventually turned up a persisting source of ongoing contamination. Thus far no such source has been reported in the PCA plant.
Could just generally filthy conditions account for this level of contamination? I suppose it could, but conditions that bad should have gotten them shut down.
So, what went wrong with the inspection system? The plant had some previous issues on inspections, but they also received some decent ratings by inspectors from private agencies, and never seemed close to being shut down. My guess is that the plant actually didn't look that bad. The FDA's recent inspection paints a fairly shocking picture, but take out the salmonella testing findings and I guarantee you there are plenty of food plants (and restaurants!) operating as I write that have worse conditions than those cited. (Let alone conditions in foreign plants that export to the US.)
I think that the source of the ongoing contamination was more subtle than just general nastiness. (One possibility would be mis-handling of product re-work and scrap. Once salmonella is present in the lines, consistent improper handling of re-work and scrap could continually re-introduce salmonella into the system downstream from the roasters.)
I haven't seen anything in press reports or in the FDA's report to suggest that there was a continuing source of contamination, let alone what that source could be . But I also don't think that the FDA's initial findings come close to identifying a root cause for this outbreak.
2009 Peanut Recall List of Links
- The FDA's main page on the recall, including list of affected products.
- The Center for Disease Control's report in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
- Peanut Corporation of America's home page. (Not a place you normally want to have to list your agent for service of process.)
- American Peanut Council, including list of unaffected products.
- The Atlanta Journal Constitution's reporting, which looks to be the most comprehensive.
- Follow the politicians' reactions in the Senate.
Studying the FDA’s Observations at PCA, #10
Observation #10 -- Finally!
Roaches! Yikes. I lived in the South for many years. Chapel Hill and Carrboro, North Carolina. Washington, D.C. Charlottesville, Virginia. And in New Orleans. Being of Dutch descent and raised in a family of fanatical cleaners, I never adjusted to the roaches. There are roaches everywhere in Dixie. When our kids were small, messy eaters we once had roaches in our SUV.
This is not to defend PCA, but to keep roaches out of a South Georgia peanut plant it would have to be sealed as tight as drum. If the FDA's reports and press accounts are correct, the PCA plant was not.
Pest control is a huge deal in the peanut business, because everything that crawls, flies, and walks seems to love to eat peanuts. It is a matter of endless vigilance.
The FDA has posted the report on its inspections of the PCA facility on the FDA website, here. As PCA has noted on its website, the FDA's findings are not final, and PCA will have the opportunity to respond
Studying the FDA’s Observations at PCA, #9
Obeservation #9 covers several basic cleaning and sanitation issues. The washroom sounds icky, that's for sure. I confess that the FDA would have said the same thing about our ingredient feed area back when we were in the industrial market -- it was impossible to keep clean.
The FDA has posted the report on its inspections of the PCA facility on the FDA website, here. As PCA has noted on its website, the FDA's findings are not final, and PCA will have the opportunity to respond.
Studying the FDA’s Observations at PCA, #8
Observation #8 is that a sink was used both for cleaning hands and cleaning mops. That is nasty.
The FDA has posted the report on its inspections of the PCA facility on the FDA website, here. As PCA has noted on its website, the FDA's findings are not final, and PCA will have the opportunity to respond.
Studying the FDA’s Observations at PCA, #7
I'm working my way through the FDA's report on its inspections of the PCA facility. The agency made 10 observations, this post deals with #7.
The FDA has posted the report on its inspections of the PCA facility on the FDA website, here. As PCA has noted on its website, the FDA's findings are not final, and PCA will have the opportunity to respond.
Observation #7 notes that the building does not have positive air pressure in the production area. The idea here is that if the production area has postive air pressure, then when a door is opened to a warehouse, raw material storage, the outside, etc., air will flow out. If air flows in, there is the risk the air flow will carry in something nasty.
For a typical high volume peanut roasting operation, this is a problem, because the large roasters consume large volumes of air -- they have huge exhaust fans on them to take away smoke and cool the peanuts. To create positive air pressure in a roasting area would require a huge air make up unit to replace the air the roaster was exhausting out. The make up unit would use outside air, which, it seems to me, carries the potential for nasties as well. Unless this must be filtered in some way. This is not a simple fix.
PCA's problem, however, appears to have been more fundamental -- their production area was not behind a wall at all. Perhaps is this allowed by the Georgia Dep't of Ag. -- in Michigan, it is absolutely forbidden. All receiving and warehouse areas must be physically separated from production areas.
Studying the FDA’s Observations at PCA, #6
Observation #6 addresses two everyday health inspection matters. You have to be able to properly clean and sanitize food contact surfaces and you have to keep stuff covered up as much as you can.
The FDA has posted the report on its inspections of the PCA facility on the FDA website, here. As PCA has noted on its website, the FDA's findings are not final, and PCA will have the opportunity to respond.