USDA has associated the Cargill E. coli ground beef recall with three confirmed illnesses caused by the identical strain of E. coli 026. There are two cases in Maine and one in New York.  The agency’s initial Cargill ground beef recall distribution list includes 26 BJ’s Wholesale Club stores in Maine, New York, Connecticut, Maryland, Virginia, New Hampshire, New Jersey and New York.

An active E. coli ground beef investigation is continuing. The tainted Cargill ground beef was produced June 11 for use or freezing by July 1. People started to get sick  June 24. Public health officials at the state and federal level are concerned that more outbreak cases could surface if consumers unknowingly pull recalled ground beef from their home freezers for meal preparation.

Cargill’s recalled ground beef was sold to BJ’s Wholesale Club in 42-pound cases. Fourteen-pound “chubs” inside the cases were for repackaging into trays of ground beef for sale in BJ’s Wholesale Club meat cases. The products subject to recall bear the establishment number “EST. 9400″ inside the USDA mark of inspection. The Class I recall covers 8,500 pounds of Cargill ground beef.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, E. coli O157:H7 causes 73,000 illnesses and 50 deaths every year in the United States.  Another six E. coli strains – including O26 — are less pervasive but just as capable of causing severe illness, including hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS).

Due to a gaping shortfall in federal law, only E. coli 0157:H7 is banned from ground beef as an adulterant. The prohibition hasn’t ended E. coli 0157:H7 contamination, but it has forced meatpackers to constantly test for it and it also calls for routine government testing of the products.

An FSIS ground beef recall announcement said Cargill Meat Solutions Corp of Pennsylvania is recalling 8.500 pounds of ground beef that may be contaminated with E. coli 026, a potentially lethal human pathogen. The meat was produced June 11 and sold in 14-pound “chubs” to retailers who repackaged it for meat case display. The affected store brands haven’t been announced yet. The tainted ground beef was initially shipped to distribution centers in Connecticut and Maryland for further sale.

Two people from Maine and one from New York have been infected by the same identical strain of E. coli 026 and health investigators in the two states are continuing their efforts to learn the extent of this outbreak.  Cargill is a large multi-national corporation that has been involved in E. coli ground beef recalls and outbreaks in the past. FSIS has found a convincing association between the Maine and New York E. coli cases and ground beef from Cargill.

Eating ground beef is a well-established mode of shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC). The most prevalent type of STEC is O157:H7, but E. coli 026 also produces shiga toxin that attacks a person’s red blood cells. In 5 to 15 percent of STEC infections, patients develop hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) or thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP), a related condition.

HUS is the leading cause of kidney failure, worldwide, in children. It also can damage other parts of a person’s body, including the heart, brain and central nervous system. HUS in children is deadly in about 5 percent of cases.

Here is the Cargill E. coli ground beef recall announcement:

The products subject to recall bear the establishment number “EST. 9400″ inside the USDA mark of inspection. The recall includes 42-pound cases of “GROUND BEEF FINE 90/10,” containing three (3) – approximately 14 pound chubs each. These products have a “use/freeze by” date of “07/01/10,” and an identifying product code of “W69032.”

The recall announcement is being amended to revise the geographic distribution and to note that some of the recalled products were distributed to a firm in California for further processing. The further-processing facility is not named. The products subject to recall bear the establishment number “EST. 8268″ inside the USDA mark of inspection as well as a production code of 27509 through 01210. These products were produced on various dates between Oct. 2, 2009 and Jan. 12, 2010. They were distributed to retail outlets and institutional foodservice providers in California, Nevada, Washington, Oregon, Arizona and internationally, and to a firm in California for further processing, the amended recall said.

USDA became aware of the problem on July 15 when the agency was notified by the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) of a small E. coli O157:H7 cluster of illnesses with a rare strain as determined by DNA fingerprinting. A total of six patients with illness onset dates between April 8 and June 18, 2010 were reported at that time. After further review, CDPH added another patient from February to the case count, bringing the count to seven.

FSIS is continuing to work with the CDPH and the company on the investigation. Anyone with signs or symptoms of foodborne illness should contact a health care provider.

The South Gate, California company ground beef recall includes about 35,000 pounds of various ground beef products that have the establishment number “EST. 6217″ inside the USDA mark of inspection. They were produced from June 7, 2010 through June 21, 2010 and distributed to Los Angeles restaurants and other restaurants in the Orange County area. The recalled beef includes the following products:

• 20-, 30- and 40-pound bulk packages of “SOUTH GATE MEAT CO. GROUND BEEF.”
• 30-, 40-, and 50-pound bulk packages of “SOUTH GATE MEAT CO. COARSE GROUND BEEF.”
• 10- and 20-pound packages of “SOUTH GATE MEAT CO. GROUND BEEF PATTIES.

Inspection of samples through microbiological testing by the FSIS originally revealed the E. coli beef contamination.

The FSIS classifies this E. coli O157:H7 ground beef recall as a “Class I” Recall, which means, according to the FSIS:

“This is a health hazard situation where there is a reasonable probability that the use of the product will cause serious, adverse health consequences or death.”

The recall involves about 3,700 pounds of various ground beef products that may be contaminated with this dangerous pathogen. This was discovered through microbiological testing by the FSIS. The potentially Ecoli-contaminated beef products that are being recalled have the establishment code “EST. 20889″ inside the USDA mark of inspection and are dated “10164″ and “10166.” Produced on June 11, 2010, and June 15, 2010, these products were distributed to food service institutions in Connecticut, New Jersey and New York and include the following products:

• 24, 8-ounce burgers in 12-pound boxes of “W.B. STOCKYARD, KEEP REFRIGERATED, BURGER FRESH, WB HOME STYLE 8 OZ.”
• 32, 6-ounce burgers in 12-pound boxes of “W.B. STOCKYARD, KEEP REFRIGERATED, BURGER FRESH 6 OZ.”
• 48, 4-ounce burgers in 12-pound boxes of “W.B. STOCKYARD, KEEP REFRIGERATED, BURGER FRESH, 4 OZ.”
• 10-pound boxes of “W.B. STOCKYARD, KEEP REFRIGERATED, BEEF GROUND/EXTRA LEAN.”
• 10- and 20-pound boxes of “W.B. STOCKYARD, KEEP REFRIGERATED, BEEF GROUND 80/20.”

The E coli ground beef recall involves packages with the establishment number “Est. 6116″ on the label and the meat was produced between May 3 and May 13, 2010. The ground beef products were distributed to retailers and government establishments for further processing in the Los Angeles area. The products include:

• Various pound packages of “MONTCLAIR MEAT CO. GROUND BEEF”
• Various pound packages of “MONTCLAIR MEAT CO. ALL BEEF PATTIES”

FSIS discovered the E. coli O157:H7 contamination in the meat through microbiological sampling. More detailed retail and distribution information will be posted here, if and when it becomes available.

E. coli is a serious foodborne illness that can cause serious gastrointestinal symptoms including severe abdominal pain and bloody diarrhea. It can develop into more serious complications including hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS), which can cause kidney failure and other serious, ongoing medical conditions. The food poisoning attorneys at Pritzker Olsen law firm have extensive experience representing victims of serious foodborne illnesses including E. coli O147:H7 and E. coli HUS. If you or a loved one suspect you’ve contracted and E. coli infection, be sure to visit the doctor and ask to be tested for that specific pathogen. Those sickened by foodborne illness may have a legal case against the food producers, distributors and others.

The products subject to recall include:

• Various pound packages of “MONTCLAIR MEAT CO. GROUND BEEF”
• Various pound packages of “MONTCLAIR MEAT CO. ALL BEEF PATTIES”

Each package bears establishment number “Est. 6116″ inside the USDA mark of inspection. These ground beef products were produced between the dates of May 3, 2010 through May 13, 2010, and were shipped to retailers and federal establishments for further processing in the Los Angeles, California, metropolitan area.

The problem was discovered through FSIS microbiological sampling. FSIS has received no reports of illnesses associated with consumption of these products.

The CDC now states 26 cases from 11 states have matching strains of E. coli O157:H7. One case has been reported in each of the following states: California, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York and Vermont. Two cases have been reported in both Maine and Pennsylvania, four cases are in Connecticut and New Hampshire and eight cases are in Massachusetts.

Of all 26 cases, 16 patients have been hospitalized, 3 developed hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS), a type of kidney failure, and two have died. Thirteen of these cases have been confirmed by advanced secondary DNA tests to be linked to the Fairbank Farms products, while secondary tests are pending on samples from other cases. Depending on these results, the number of cases associated with this outbreak may increase or decrease.

Of  all the revelations made by New York Times reporter Michael Moss in his excellent food safety story last Sunday, the one that jumped off the page the most was a quote from a safety officer at American Foodservice, a company that grinds one million pounds of hamburger a day.

The officer, Timothy P. Biela, said big slaughterhouses won’t sell beef trimmings to grinding plants if the plants test incoming shipments for E. coli O157:H7, a potentially deadly pathogen that was banned from finished ground beef in 1994.

“They would not sell to us,” Biela said. “If I test and it’s positive, I put them in a regulatory situation. So we don’t do that.”

What he is saying is that the big slaughterhouses are wary that a positive E. coli test at a grinding plant would trigger huge recalls of meat sold to others plants as well. It’s a dangerous industry practice and the USDA’s Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS), the agency in charge of ensuring meat safety, has been looking the other way.

In fact, the FSIS has the power to change this, but they choose not to. Why?  The practice only protects unsanitary slaughterhouses. Dr. Kenneth Petersen, an assistant administrator with FSIS, told the Times that his department could mandate testing, but that it needed to consider the impact on companies as well as consumers.

“I have to look at the entire industry, not just what is best for public health,”  Petersen said.

Amazing stuff, especially when you consider the bottom line of the Times’ story: Eating ground beef is still a gamble — one that can cost lives when E. coli O157:H7 infections develop into hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) – which happens in five to 10 percent of all cases. In the prime example of the Times story, a Minnesota dance instructor was paralyzed from the waist down after eating a hamburger produced by Cargill that was laden with the outbreak strain of E. coli O157:H7 in a 2007 outbreak that sickened more than 900 people.

The story traced the ingredients that  went into the contaminated, frozen patties made by Cargill. The “Angus Beef Patties,” as labeled,  were actually made from cheap, low-grade trimmings and scraps that came from cow parts that were more likely to come in contact with feces during slaughter than more expensive cuts. The fatty ingredients came from slaughter plants in Nebraska, Texas, Uruguay and South Dakota and were mixed together to make frozen patties. The South Dakota ingredients had been treated with ammonia to kill bacteria, the story said.

In 2008, the USDA issued draft guidelines to slaughterhouses and grinders saying every production lot should be sampled and tested fore leaving the supplier and again at the receiver. But after the draft guideline received negative reaction from industry, the guidelines were never made official.

What could be more important than guarding public health? Isn’t that the ultimate consideration with food?  After reading the New York Times story, the truth is that money sometimes comes first.

If you or a loved one has been sickened in a ground beef E. coli outbreak, contact national food safety law firm Pritzker Olsen Attorneys. Our firm is one of the few in the country practicing extensively in the area of foodborne illness litigation. We have collected tens of millions for victims of food poisoning and we  also are dedicated to the prevention of pathogenic outbreaks. For more information, call a food safety lawyer at 1-888-377-8900 (Toll Free). To receive a free case consultation, , complete one of our online forms.