United States: Health authorities reported that another person has died of listeria illness from deli meats made by Boar’s Head for a total of 10 deaths.
More about the news
Another recent update from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention added in New York State one more death. Overall, sixty people have been confirmed to have fallen sick and hospitalized after consuming the above products that were contaminated with the above dangerous bacterium.
According to the CDC, “One person got sick during their pregnancy and remained pregnant after recovering,” US News reported.
More about the incidence
Jarratt, Virginia-based manufacturing plant of Boar’s Head, which was identified as the source of Listeria, is the recent food-borne disease outbreak and has been shut indefinitely since September 13.
Boar’s Head added that it also believes it has identified where contamination can originate from.
According to the company in a statement released on September 13, “Our investigation has identified the root cause of the contamination as a specific production process that only existed at the Jarratt facility and was used only for liverwurst. With this discovery, we have decided to permanently discontinue liverwurst,” US News reported.
Continuous loss of lives has happened in Florida, Illinois, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia.
It is now the biggest listeria outbreak recorded in the US since another one in 2011 that was traceable to contaminated cantaloupes, the CDC said.
The recall has been spread to 71 products processed between May 10 and July 29 under Boar’s Head and Old Country brand.
Some of the suspect products may even still be in family refrigerators, as some of them had sell dates as far back as October.
According to the CDC, “Everyone should check their homes for any remaining recalled Boar’s Head products since they can have [a long] shelf life,” US News reported.
“Look for ‘EST. 12612’ or ‘P-12612’ inside the USDA mark of inspection on the product labels,” CDC added.
Plant shutdown calls
Calls to shut down the Jarratt plant have been made due to the firm’s receipt of citations from the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) in the past two years.
On July 30, the recall of Boars Head deli meats expanded to an extra 7 million pounds of product because they also could contain Listeria monocytogenes bacteria.
In a letter from FSIS to Boars Head on July 31, the agency said that it was requiring the Jarratt plant to stop operations because of continuous failures by the company “to maintain sanitary conditions.”