Imported edible leaves collected at retail sale in England during 2017 with an emphasis on betel and curry leaves: microbiological quality with respect toSalmonella, Shiga-toxin-producingE. coli(STEC) and levels ofEscherichia coli

Abstract

Among all food tested by Public Health England (approximately 11 000 per annum), curry leaves were the herb most commonly contaminated with Salmonella, and betel leaves were the most commonly contaminated ready-to-eat food. The high proportion with unsatisfactory E. coli levels and the detection of STEC suggests risks of contamination by multiple enteric pathogens.

Whole genome sequencing reveals antimicrobial resistance determinants (AMR genes) of Salmonella enterica recovered from raw chicken and ready-to-eat leaves imported into England between 2014 and 2019

“…An increase in Salmonella outbreaks associated with minimally processed foods such as salads and herbs has occurred since the early 2000s (Schierstaedt et al, 2019), as well as a large outbreak associated with the consumption of curry leaves (Waldram, Lawler, et al, 2018b), has increased interest in edible leaves as a food safety risk. The occurrence of Salmonella in edible imported herbs and leaves in the human food chain in England was previously reported (McLauchlin et al, 2018;Willis et al, 2015). Contamination is most likely to occur at primary production (during cultivation, from contaminated soil or water, by contact with livestock or human waste or from wild animals) but may also occur through poor hygiene throughout the food chain (Schierstaedt et al, 2019).…”

“…Public health risks associated with Salmonella contamination of imported edible betel leaves have previously been described (McLauchlin et al, 2019 ). We previously reported a Salmonella contamination rate of 16% on 279 edible leaves imported into the UK (McLauchlin et al, 2018 ). Further data were reported on betel leaves where a Salmonella contamination rate of 23% was detected among 2110 samples tested (McLauchlin et al, 2019 ).…”

Genomic characterization of Salmonella Uzaramo for human invasive infection

“…Uzaramo isolates into two different sublineages. Sublineage Ⅰ comprised two STs, ST4543 isolates which are linked to raw produce [37], and ST3269 isolates which have mainly been isolated from human stool samples. U302, a lake-water isolate, was clustered together with ST3269 isolates.…”

Salmonella control in poultry flocks and its public health impact

“…S. Derby is considered to be less virulent than many serovars and lacks certain genes associated with invasiveness (Litrup et al, 2010;Hauser et al, 2011;Card et al, 2016), but large numbers of cases occur in countries with high consumption of uncooked or lightly cooked pig meat and outside the EU strains with MDR and an extended host range are reported (Xu et al, 2017;Cao et al, 2018b), reflecting the occurrence of MDR in many bacterial species in response to liberal antimicrobial use in food animals. S. Newport is also among the most common Salmonella serovars acquired in the EU, but this serovar is very diverse genetically (Zheng et al, 2017b) and many strains are not considered to have a primary reservoir in food animals, being frequently found in wildlife, reptile and amphibian pets and foods of non-animal origin (McLauchlin et al, 2018;Pan et al, 2018a;Teplitski and de Moraes, 2018). The MDR S. Newport clones that are common in the USA and Canada (Campbell et al, 2018;Cao et al, 2018a) are not known to be resident in the EU (Espie et al, 2005;Horton et al, 2016) and despite the MDR profile, appear to be less virulent than S. Typhimurium (Parisi et al, 2018).…”