Ground poultry products have been gaining in popularity as an alternative to ground beef. The ground poultry is lighter in flavor and is often lower in fat making it a good choice for the health conscious consumer who doesn’t want to sacrifice his or her favorite dishes to a heart healthy diet.
As with all raw meats there should be special consideration to the handling of ground poultry. But in a clear oversight to food safety, there are no established special testing guidelines for ground chicken and turkey.
Since the same methods of grinding and mixing apply to ground poultry as they do for ground beef, shouldn’t there be routine testing of these poultry products as there are for beef? There could potentially be thousands of different birds that go into a batch of ground poultry, the same way that there may be thousands of different cows that go into a batch of hamburger. In these situations, a single contamination source could potentially infect thousands of pounds of meat.
Though not as feared as E. coli O157:H7, Campylobacter and Salmonella are real foodborne illness threats with a far greater prevalence than E. coli. We are seeing increased virulence of Salmonella strains along with increased antibiotic resistance. Campylobacter is commonly found in poultry meat and is the number one cause of bacterial diarrheal illness in the world. Campylobacter has also been closely related to the dangerous nerve disease Guillain-Barre syndrome. The CDC has estimated that as high as 40% of all Guillain-Barre syndrome cases are caused by an infection of Campylobacter bacteria.
As the growing popularity of ground poultry rises, the FSIS should take steps to contain the threats of foodborne illness before they become an epidemic problem. Perhaps it is time to rethink the testing of ground poultry before we see an outbreak put thousands of people at serious risk.
