Posted on 10/08/2006 3:11:12 PM PDT by varina davis
Lettuce from California's Salinas Valley recalled over E. coli concerns
By RACHEL KONRAD (Associated Press Writer)
October 08, 2006 4:41 PM EDT
SAN FRANCISCO - Less than a week after the Food and Drug Administration lifted its warning on fresh spinach grown in California's Salinas Valley, a popular brand of lettuce grown there has been recalled over concerns about E. coli contamination.
The lettuce does not appear to have caused any illnesses, Salinas-based Nunes Co. Inc. said in a statement.
The company initiated a voluntary recall Sunday of green leaf lettuce purchased last week under the Foxy brand name. Foxy is one of the nation's largest suppliers of lettuce, celery, broccoli, vegetable platters and stir-fry mixes.
The recall covered lettuce purchased in grocery stores Oct. 3-6 in Arizona, California, Nevada, Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana. It was also sold to distributors in those states who may have sold it to restaurants.
Executives ordered the recall after learning that water used to irrigate lettuce fields may have been contaminated with E. coli, according to the company statement. E. coli can proliferate in uncooked produce, raw milk, unpasteurized juice, contaminated water and meat.
Vice President Tom Nunes Jr. and attorney Brett R. Harrell did not respond Sunday to phone calls and an e-mail seeking comment.
FDA spokeswoman Julie Zawisza said the agency is aware of the voluntary recall but had no details.
"As a standard course of action, we would expect the firm to identify the source of the contamination and take steps to ... ensure that it doesn't happen again," Zawisza wrote in an e-mail Sunday.
It's unclear whether any bacteria in the Salinas Valley lettuce fields could have come from the same source as the E. coli found in spinach that has sickened nearly 200 people and has been linked to three deaths nationwide.
Pathogenic Escherichia coli bacteria, or E. coli, may cause diarrhea and bloody stools. Although most healthy adults recover within a week without long-term side effects, some people may develop a form of kidney failure.
That illness is most likely to occur in young children, senior citizens and people with compromised immune systems. In extreme cases, it can lead to kidney damage or death.
The recall at Nunes Co., a family-owned business with more than 20,000 acres (8,000 hectares) of cropland in Arizona and California, comes days after federal agents searched two Salinas Valley produce companies connected to the nationwide spinach scare.
Epidemiologists also warned consumers this week to stay away from some bottled carrot juice after a Florida woman was paralyzed and three people in Georgia experienced respiratory failure, apparently due to botulism poisoning.
What kind of lettuce? Iceberg? My co-op just got some green leaf yesterday from the produce house. Don't know where it was shipped from.
I guess the old fashioned idea of washing all fresh produce before you eat it has gone out of style. Along with basic hygiene and sanitation. Better to grow the government, and have somebody else be responsible. Oh well. Chicken Little was right.
Oh No!
The problem with the spinach was supposed to be that washing it wasn't supposed to make a difference. I don't know if that is the case here.
Purely coincidence that all these food safety stories coming out at the same time that Vice Chairman of the Agriculture comittee Richard Pombo is in a tough reelection fight. Couldn't possibly be an attempt to embarass him. /sarcasm.
About 7 years ago, a freeper posted a thread about threats to our food supply. He mentioned chicken down in Ark. But he did not want to get too specific about the types of threats that are out there. I never forgot that thread, wouldn't even know how to search for it.
If spinach can be contaminated, then I would think all other produce could be. I'm sticking to V-8 for the time being and only veggies and fruits than can be peeled or pared.
Just great. :(
My climate is favorable for planting greens right now so it sounds like if I want to fix any salads for my family, I had best get busy cleaning up my old garden plot.
After the spinach contamination, where the e-coli was inside the actual plant, washing my greens before eating them isn't going to make me feel any safer.
I heard "the word". I call BS. The cellular membranes of plant material are such that if plants could indeed be organic hosts to E-coli; human life on this planet would cease to exist. Not one independent laboratory published conclusive test results. Many lawyers weighed in with their opinions. If you have a link to the lab reports that showed a conclusive case of plants being "infected" with E-coli, please post it. Contamination and infection are two different things.
I guess read, think, type has gone out of style...if produce is watered with tainted water, as is suspected in the case of spinach, it can't be washed off, because it's inside the plant. It can only be cooked or discarded.
You cannot wash-out E-Coli, I have also heard on here that you can't cook it out. Some say bleach will work but that you should not use it all the time.
Lucky you. We're supposed to get snow tomorrow.
When you hire illegals and then don't provide outhouses (or enough in the right location) what do they expect? I have friends who got e-coli from cantalope... people don't think about the skin contaminating the fruit when you cut into it.
I don't think just cooking; from waht I read some babies got sick off spinich babyfood.
OH!Why does'nt somebody have the guts to say what this really is?Its illegals that are intentionally doing this because things are'nt going the way they want.This is clearly an act of terrorism and an example should be made.
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