In his blog today, Dr. James Marsden discusses a paper that Dr. David Smith presented at a recent Meeting of the Beef Industry Food Safety Council (BIFSCo). We thought his post was presented very well and worth repeating here. You can register for free to receive Dr. Marsden’s blog here.
BIFSCo is a part of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) and its members are professionals working throughout the beef supply chain.
In his paper, Dr Smith gave a history of the 1924 Standard Milk Ordinance. Tuberculosis was the public health threat that led to the passing of the ordinance. TB was a major health problem in the US at that time and is still a major health problem in developing nations.
When the public health officials began, what eventually became a huge public health success, of eliminating TB in milk they used a multiple hurdle approach that is very similar to the approach that VeriPrime is proposing to eliminate E. coli in beef.
First, they attacked the problem at its source, in the cow.
Second, they initiated interventions inside the processing plant (pasteurization.)
Third, they made consumers aware and increased demand for pasteurized milk.
He also points out that when they started working on it the problem of TB had to look impossible to tackle and completely overwhelming. Much like the problem of E. coli 0157:H7 in beef looks today. Yet using the principles of a multi hurdle approach, they virtually eliminated the threat of TB from adulterated milk. At VeriPrime, our members believe that by working together we can do the same with E. coli.
