E Coli Level In Ground Beef example essay topic

This article that I read is about how the E. Coli level in ground beef could be higher in the warm months. There are a lot of statistics in it about how much E. Coli is in a certain number of samples of meat and what we can do to kill the virus. It doesn't really talk about the rise of E. Coli in the warmer months as much as it talks about how the percent has increased since 1995. The government test of raw ground beef suggests that levels of E. Coli 0157: H 7, which is a potentially dangerous type of bacteria, have been rising over the past 5 years.

But, less than one percent of the samples that are tested, test positive for the bacteria. This may get higher due to better surveillance for the bacteria. Researchers found that there might be some variation in the levels of E. Coli depending on the seasons. There are higher levels of E. Coli detected in the raw meat during June through September and lower ones in the cooler months. The seasonal variation went well with patterns of documented human E. Coli infection diseases. But this doesn't mean these people got it from eating meat during warm months, these people might have had it because of increased fruit and vegetable consumption. E. Coli is a potentially deadly bacterium.

It causes bloody diarrhea and dehydration. The people with weak ammine systems like old people and very young people are the most susceptible to food borne illnesses cause by the pathogen. The bacterium infects about 73,000 Americans each year and that is usually through undercooked or contaminated ground beef. Meat is not the only place it is though.

You can get it from unpasteurized milk and juices, contaminated water, and fruits and vegetables that have been exposed fertilizer... In 1994, the United States Department of Agriculture Food Safety and Inspection Service implemented a surveillance program to help determine the levels of bacteria in food due to the growing number of cases involving the E. Coli infection during the last decade. Scientists with the USDA tested sample of raw ground beef taken from government-inspected testing places as well as grocery stores around the country and gave the results at the 2002 International Conference on Emerging Infectious Diseases in Atlanta, Georgia. The results said that 47 of the 16,366 samples taken from the federal inspection sites tested positive for E. coli. From the samples from the grocery stores, 19 out of the 7,885 samples contained it. This was from the years of 1995-2000.

Over that 5 year period, the number of samples with the bacteria rose steadily. It increased from. 08 percent in 1995 to. 50 percent in 2000 for government facilities. In grocery stores it went from. 07 percent in 1995 to.

86 percent in 2000. Since this is one of the first studies to look at this strain of bacteria, there is nothing to compare it to. But, the percents do seem to be low since they are all under one percent. Since there seems to be an increase in the level of bacteria they are going to have to do more tests and see if they can some how stop it. One of the only ways to kill the bacteria is to cook the meat or ground beef thoroughly. If you do that there is no way that you can get it from simply eating ground beef.

But make sure you wash your fruits and vegetables before eating them because of the fertilizer. This is a good article it made you realize that you really do have to be careful about cooking your meat properly and washing your fruits and vegetables. It made aware of what the E. Coli virus can do to you, that it can be life threatening. During the next few years they will be doing more testing to figure out if you can stop the E. Coli virus from increasing in amount in our food.

Bibliography

E. Coli level in Ground Beek Higher in Warm Months, Kansas City Star. com / health Encarta Encyclopedia, 1996. E. Coli.