BELIZEANS WARNED ABOUT CONTAMINATED POULTRY PRODUCT

March 22, 2007

Belizean consumers are warned of United States meat recall. The Ministry of Health and the Belize Agricultural Health Authority, BAHA, inform the public of an alert issued by the Caribbean Epidemiology Center, CAREC advising consumers not to eat the Oscar Mayer/Louis Rich Brand chicken products since they may be contaminated with the Listeria mono-cytogenes bacteria. According to Doctor Michael Deshield, the Director of the Food Safety Department of the Belize Agricultural Health Authority, although Belize do not import these products there is cause for concern especially for those traveling.

Doctor Michael Deshield: Director of the Food Safety Department

“An alert that was sent from our partners CAREC Caribbean Epidemiological Center in Trinidad alerting us to the fact that the USDA has identified with Oscar Mayer, Louis Rich chicken breast and strip because the company has a recall of some two point eight million pounds of that product in the U-S. The alert came mainly because a lot of that product in exported in the Caribbean, Belize is fortunate enough that we have a poultry industry here and we supply most of the fresh poultry products to Belize so we have not really imported any fresh product like the chicken breast here in Belize. So it’s not so much as a problem and we have checked that BAHA data base the Belize Health Authority has a dada base to look at imports and we don’t have any of that product imported in. But because it is a concern because it came from our partners in the Caribbean we said it’s best that put an alert so that people are aware that it is a problem. So we are just being proactive to let consumers be aware that this is an issue and they should be aware of it, especially if they are traveling to the Caribbean or if they are traveling to the U-S.” 

Desheild explains listeria monocytogenes and the fact that it also affects cattle.

Doctor Michael Deshield: Director of the Food Safety Department

“It is a bacteria the problem with it, it grows under refrigerated condition and it is especially a problem for women who are pregnant it can cause abortion it can cause neurological defects so it is a very dangerous bacteria. It affects animals as well actually in cattle it causes circling disease sometimes you can mistake it for rabies or something like that so it’s a bacteria out there  that we have to be aware of and to do certain measures to prevent.” 

Doctor Michael Deshield, the Director of the Food Safety Department of the Belize Agricultural Health Authority. The chicken products, exported to several Caribbean countries, subject to this recall, bear the establishment number, “P dash 1-9-6-7-6” inside the USDA mark of inspection with the “Use by” date being earlier than May 28^th, 2007. Deshield says that recently, here in Belize, there were recalls on peanut butter. He says that BAHA managed to control that situation by removing the product from grocery shelves, countrywide, with the support of the Public Health Departments. Any questions and concerns can be forwarded to the BAHA’s Food Safety Services at 2-2-4-4-7-9-4 or email foodsafety@btl.net or they can contact the Ministry of Health.

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