Food Quality

Quality is important for fresh foods as well as for manufactured goods. Cases of E. coli outbreaks are becoming more common, at least to my perception. I would be interested in hearing from experts in the food management industry about common methods to prevent E.coli outbreaks and how those controls may be failing.

An interesting fact is that due to the time required for an outbreak to become identifiable and the perishable nature of the food, sometimes the evidence is lost.

California is the source of E. coli-tainted iceberg lettuce suspected to have sickened 36 people in Michigan, officials said Thursday.

The culprit probably is industrial-size packages of iceberg lettuce sold to restaurants and institutions, according to the Michigan Department of Community Health.
Although lettuce is the "common link" among all the cases, the produce is so perishable that state agencies were not able to test packages produced during the outbreak's time frame, Holton said. So far, all tests for E. coli in lettuce have come back negative.