The World Health Organization recently issued a communiqué saying that 11 countries have recently reported cases of Salmonella infection suspected to be associated with chocolate produced in Belgium, and that chocolate contaminated with Salmonella has been sold to at least 113 countries and territories.
The World Health Organization introduced the United Kingdom on March 27 to the organization reported a group of salmonella infection cases, the investigation shows that the source of infection can be traced back to December 2021 and January 2022 Italy Ferrero Group in Belgium Arlon’s factory production Kinder chocolate series.
A global recall of the chocolates in question has been launched, although the topic of salmonella remains hot.
Highly susceptible to food poisoning
“Salmonella belongs to the Enterobacteriaceae family, a type of Gram-negative enterobacteria to be exact.” Tianjin Customs Import and Export Food Safety Division, Food Safety Section II Officer Niu Jingyang in an interview with Science and Technology Daily, the American pathologist Salmon and others isolated this bacteria in 1885 and named it Salmonella.
Do not underestimate the salmonella, it is a common food-borne pathogenic bacteria, very easy to cause food poisoning, mainly by contaminating food endanger human health.
“At the same time, Salmonella is the most complex genus in the family of enterobacteria, its ‘family’ is very large. More than 2,500 different types of Salmonella have been identified, of which about 1,400 are capable of infecting humans.” Niu Jinan said that the salmonella that causes bacterial foodborne illness is mainly foodborne non-typhoid Salmonella. This triggered the “chocolate contamination” incident of Salmonella typhimurium, is also a relatively common.
Wang Yimin, chief physician of the Department of Critical Care Medicine at TEDA Hospital in Tianjin, was interviewed by Science and Technology Daily and introduced that people infected with Salmonella may develop fever, diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain and other symptoms, which usually last 2 to 7 days. Most infected people can heal themselves without special treatment.
“For people who are physically strong, the most common consequence of a salmonella infection is diarrhea. However, if special people such as infants, the elderly and people with low immune function are infected with this bacteria, serious and life-threatening symptoms may occur, such as bloodstream infection and infectious toxic shock.” Wang Yimin reminded that patients need to seek medical attention immediately when they have any symptoms such as fever, prolonged diarrhea or vomiting, deficiency, depression, little or no urination and pus and blood in the stool.
Vigorous and “long-lived”
This is not the first time that Salmonella has “messed up”, there have been reports of food poisoning caused by it. “Salmonella is difficult to prevent, mainly because there are salmonella everywhere in our lives.” Niu Jingang said, it is widely distributed in nature, any food may be contaminated by it, and the food contaminated by salmonella in appearance and taste and normal food is no different.
Salmonella often resides in people and animals, especially poultry, livestock in the intestine. Its main transmission route is fecal oral transmission, that is, the intestinal tract of Salmonella from the feces, and then through direct or indirect contamination of water and food, and again by people or other animals ingested, the pathogen and again by the feces was discharged, so continuous cycle of transmission.
Various kinds of poultry and livestock in the process of feeding, slaughtering, transportation, packaging and other processing, there are opportunities to be infected with Salmonella; Salmonella can also enter the egg through the complete egg shell, and then contaminate eggs or egg products; dairy and its products, such as ice cream, bagged cooked food, etc., can also be contaminated by Salmonella. In addition, fruits, vegetables, peanut butter, oats and other common foods have the potential to be contaminated with Salmonella.
“Salmonella contaminated chocolate is not common, but food in the process of processing, transportation, selling process are likely to be contaminated by Salmonella.” Niu Jingang analysis.
“Even outside the human or animal body, Salmonella is extremely viable: it can survive for 2 to 3 weeks in water, up to 8 months in the cesspool, and 75 days in cured meat. It takes 15 minutes to kill it, even in an environment over 60 degrees Celsius.” Niu Jingang said, strong vitality and long “life”, increased the difficulty of eliminating salmonella.
But Salmonella is not invulnerable, intolerance of high temperature is its “death knell. “When the temperature reaches 75 degrees Celsius, Salmonella can be inactivated within 10 minutes, so the best way to prevent Salmonella is to cook the food thoroughly before eating. In addition, when handling food, it is best to separate raw and cooked plates to avoid cross-infection.” Niu Jingang suggested.
However, if you encounter food that can not be heated at high temperatures, such as ice cream, how do we sterilize it?
In this regard, Niu Jinan suggested: “When buying and selling food, especially when buying meat, milk and eggs, be sure to buy qualified products. When choosing fruits, vegetables and other agricultural products, consumers should try to choose fresh products and wash thoroughly before consumption.”
“When storing food it is also important to store unheated cooked meat foods separately from fruits, vegetables, cooked foods and other foods that are directly in your mouth.” Niu Jingang suggested that raw and cold food should not be left at room temperature for more than two hours, after which the risk of being infected by bacteria rises sharply.
