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CNN Saturday Morning News
Interview With Elsa Murano
Aired July 20, 2002 - 09:12 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Health officials have recalled more than 18 million pounds of ground beef that could be contaminated with the E. coli bacteria. So far, more than a dozen people have been sickened by meat processed by ConAgra Beef Company in Colorado.
Here to talk more about this beef recall, put it into some perspective and some tips for you at home, is medical correspondent Rea Blakey. Rea, good to have you with us.
REA BLAKEY, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Miles.
This is a Class 1 recall, and that's the most serious. It means there's a reasonable probability of serious adverse health consequences, possibly death. This latest voluntary recall of more than 18 million pounds is an extension of a voluntary recall ConAgra first initiated on June 30.
Now, at that time, 354,000 pounds of ground beef products were recalled. ConAgra is the nation's second-largest retail food supplier.
Thirty government food inspectors are at the Greeley, Colorado, plant at all times, in fact, routine random samples are frequently taken. One taken May 9 turned up positive for E. coli. That triggered USDA to take daily samples for 15 days. And the sample taken the 12th day tested positive.
Once it was determined that sample was from ConAgra's Greeley plant, inspectors took yet another sample from an unopened package on June 24. Five days later, that sample was confirmed positive for E. coli. On June 30, ConAgra began its voluntary recall.
Now, USDA says it's been testing everything since July 11, with no more positive results.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANN VENEMAN, SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE: The U.S. Department of Agriculture immediately dispatched additional -- an additional team of food safety scientists and other experts to that facility to begin an in-depth investigation into the situation at hand. We have been working very closely with CDC and the Colorado Department of Health on this issue.
In addition, ConAgra has been very cooperative throughout this review process.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BLAKEY: The suspect ground beef can be found in many forms, and may have already been repackaged by your local grocery store. So check the government Web site at fsis.usda.gov. The department also has a special telephone information number for consumers, that number, 800-535-4555.
Now, not sure if you've already been infected? Well, symptoms of E. coli contamination include stomach cramps or tenderness, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting. Fever, however, is unlikely. If it does occur, it would very likely be mild.
Children under the age of 5 and the elderly and people with weakened immune systems are the people at greatest risk. Cooking hamburger to an internal temperature of 160 degrees -- and make sure to use a digital thermometer to make sure -- well, that will kill the potentially deadly bacteria, Miles.
O'BRIEN: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...
BLAKEY: So there are things consumers can do.
O'BRIEN: All right, Rea, thank you very much. Didn't mean to interrupt you there. Microphone turned on a little early. Good to see you. We appreciate it.
BLAKEY: (UNINTELLIGIBLE).
O'BRIEN: The undersecretary for food safety at the USDA says she has no idea how much of the recalled beef is still in the hands of consumers. This morning, Dr. Elsa Murano joins us from Washington with a little bit more.
Dr. Murano, good to have you with us.
DR. ELSA MURANO, USDA: Thank you, Miles.
O'BRIEN: All right, let's put it in perspective. What do we know right now about how much is out there and how much concern we should have?
MURANO: Well, we are -- initiated a recall of 18.6 million pounds because we believe it's better to err on the side of caution with public health being really uppermost in our thinking.
So we're hoping to recall or to actually get back as much of that product as possible.
O'BRIEN: Put this in perspective, then. Is this as large a recall as you can recall? If you'll excuse that expression in this case.
MURANO: Certainly. Well, Miles, as you know, we -- the Bush administration, certainly this is the largest recall in this administration. There's been a past recall of about 25 million pounds of ground beef, so this one is not quite as large as that, but it is significant.
O'BRIEN: All right. So what's a consumer to do here? It's -- is it fairly straightforward which? Is the beef labeled in a way that it's very obvious?
MURANO: Well, the problem, Miles, is that the product may be sold through supermarket, where the supermarket has obtained it from ConAgra, has opened up the package from ConAgra, mixed it with other things, repackaged it in their own package. So consumers may not be able to find any...
O'BRIEN: So what do you do in that case?
MURANO: ... (UNINTELLIGIBLE)...
O'BRIEN: What do you do in that case?
MURANO: Well, what consumers need to do, very simply, Miles, is to take the product back to the point of purchase, whatever supermarket or store where they purchased it, and they'll be able to return it that way. I think everybody is trying to be as cautious and diligent as possible. I know that supermarket chains are being very proactive in this way.
So just your take your product back to where you bought it. You can certainly discard it if you want to. Certainly as you said before in your report, cooking to an internal temperature of 160 degrees Fahrenheit will kill any harmful bacteria that are in that product.
But if you have any questions, we really, really urge people to call our meat and poultry hotline at the phone number that you just quoted, 1-800-535-4555.
O'BRIEN: All right. Before you get away here, it is reported that the inspectors in this case waited some 10 days before notifying ConAgra that there was a problem, that E. coli had been found. That's inexcusable, 10 days, when people are out there eating beef with E. coli bacteria in it.
MURANO: Let me correct you on a couple of the facts there, if I may. We were doing a routine testing at one of ConAgra's customers at a processing plant, a routine testing that we do, and we found E. coli positive, immediately were able to certainly dispose of that product. But the issue was trying to find out and trace back where that product came from, because that customer purchases beef from other people, not only ConAgra.
So it took us a while to try to trace it back to ConAgra. Once we did, and at this time there were no outbreaks at all, is when we issued the recall on June 30. So actually the department was proactive in the sense that we were on the scene because of the June 30 recall, we were already doing a review, an extensive review of the ConAgra plant...
O'BRIEN: But (UNINTELLIGIBLE) -- wouldn't...
MURANO: ... when we found out about the outbreaks.
O'BRIEN: ... wouldn't it be prudent just to notify all the suppliers of that possibility that E. coli would exist rather than sitting on your hands for 10 days?
MURANO: Miles, I'll tell you what we did immediately is realize that absolutely had we -- that it would be a good idea for all the suppliers of the plant where we find the positive to be informed as soon as possible, so this is something that we changed immediately and issued a notice right away that that was exactly what we were going to do beginning this week.
So we have corrected our policy in that way. But again, bear in mind that there were no illnesses at that point, so if anything, because of our routine testing and the fact that we have inspectors in those plants at all times, it enabled us to be positioned so that when we did find out from the Centers for Disease Control that there were illnesses, our team was in place...
O'BRIEN: Wait, wait, wait, wait. You have to wait till there are illnesses before you do something?
MURANO: We had done something already, you see.
O'BRIEN: Well, right, but you just said...
MURANO: June 30 recall.
O'BRIEN: ... there weren't any illnesses, so you didn't do anything. But, I mean, if E. coli is out there...
MURANO: There were no illnesses, and we had issued a recall June 30. So we actually did recall 354,200 pounds, which was a fairly significant recall in and of itself. So we immediately were in that plant with a review team of consumer safety officers, compliance officers. So when we did find out that there were illnesses, the action was swift and quick.
O'BRIEN: OK. Dr. Elsa Murano, we appreciate it. She's with the USDA, and obviously hopefully some change has taken place in the way this is inspected and people are notified.
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