Cheese shop pulls products from shelves after Listeria outbreak
Listeria is a bacterium that can be found in water, soil, decaying vegetation and other moist environments, and can even survive in fridges. Foods may get contaminated at the primary production level or during processing, packing, or transporting.
Listeria causes a disease called listeriosis, the symptoms of which range from muscle aches, nausea and vomiting, and diarrhoea, and in extreme cases convulsions, confusion and even death. Pregnant women, children and the elderly are more susceptible to Listeria than healthy adults and advised to steer clear of foods that carry a high risk of contamination, such as raw fish and unpasteurised milk. It is more often found in chilled foods that don’t need to be reheated, such as pâté, cured meats, and pre-packed sandwiches.
After an order from the Food Standards Agency, the Old Cheese Room, a family-owned cheese shop based in Wiltshire, England, recalled several of their products, including their Baronet, Baby Baronet and Mini Baronet Soft Cheeses, following the testing and discovery of a Listeria infection in them.
They are recalling batches with best before dates of 22 March, 4 April, and 10 April, and have asked customers to return cheeses from these batches. No more Baronet cheeses of any kind have been made by them since the outbreak. They are swab testing the ripening room regularly, as well as cleaning and disinfecting it thoroughly. From now on, they have pledged to test every batch of cheese before it leaves their premises.
“Listeria is a persistent bacterium that can withstand high salt and high acid conditions, and it can grow at refrigeration conditions,” Marjon Wells-Bennik, a principal scientist food safety at NIZO, a contract organisation dedicated to improving food and health products, told FoodNavigator. “Many cheese types intrinsically do not support growth because of presence of lactate . . . for others (often soft cheese with a relatively high pH), growth may be…
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