On Thursday, a Class 1 Recall was issued by the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS). Tolleson, Arizona based meat producer JBS Tolleson, Inc issued a nationwide recall of 6,912,8756 pounds of “various raw, non-intact beef products” due to possible salmonella contamination.
Beef products packaged between July 26th, 2018 and September 7th, 2018 are tagged for recall. To see if your beef might be contaminated, on the package, identify the USDA mark of inspection number: #267.
Brands to watch out for are: Cedar River Farms Natural Beef, JBS Generic, Showcase, Gourmet Burger, and Grass Run Farms Natural Beef.
Salmonella cases started rolling in from August 5th to September 6th. Fourteen hospitalized patients were used to trace the source of contamination back to JBS. Since then, there are 57 confirmed cases of salmonella from 16 states.
Consumption of salmonella-contaminated products causes salmonellosis. Symptoms are diarrhea, abdominal cramps 12 to 72 hours after infection, and they typically last 4 to 7 days. If diarrhea gets worse, it could result in hospitalization. Most recover without treatment.
FSIS has a few suggestions:
If there’s contaminated beef if your fridge or freezer, make sure to throw out all food products because of possible contamination.
When you’re cooking beef, make sure it’s cooked to a temperate of 160ºF. If you’re cooking other cuts of beef, make sure it’s cooked to a temperature of 145ºF. The FSIS reports that cooking to these temperatures makes sure harmful bacteria are removed.
They’ve specifically stated that adults and infants with weakened immune systems should watch out because symptoms of salmonella can reach the level of hospitalization.
And, if you have questions call JBS USA Consumer Hotline at (800)-727-2333. Or, call the USDA Meat and Poultry Hotline at 1-(888)-674-6854.
Stay tuned as more develops and in other food news, Popeyes is serving up 24-karat gold coated chicken wings.
