Food Safety in Europe

Listeria is subject to binding microbiological criteria in foodstuffs (Regulation EU 2073/2005) (absence in 25 grams) on the date of production, Dr. Vågsholm mentions. “For some foodstuffs, the criterion at the end of shelf life is less than 100 colony-forming units (cfu) per gram,” he says. “This last criterion is to avoid wasting a lot of safe foodstuffs.”

Listeria is hard to explain simply, Dr. Vågsholm adds. “The simple version is that no Listeria should be found on the date of production, interpreted as absence in a 25-gram sample, while at the end of the shelf life there should be no more than 100 cfu per gram sample,” he explains.

Toxoplasma is dealt with by recommendations to risk groups, typically pregnant women and persons with immunosuppression, usually by national public health agencies of the EU. There is no agreement on the need for EU initiatives to control Toxoplasma in food producing animals.

“EHEC is being discussed by the EC and the EU member states,” Dr. Vågsholm says. “Currently the control measures are at slaughter, including the process hygiene criteria for carcasses, and for minced beef for E. coli, and also by end-product criteria for sprouted seeds, as per Regulation EU 2073/2005.”

A member of the EFSA Animal Health and Welfare Panel, Dr. Vågsholm says that Sweden has focused on pre-harvest solutions in food safety, has been successful with Salmonella control the last 30 years, and has banned feed antibiotics for many years, all to the country’s credit. “Additionally, veterinarians practicing in Sweden are not allowed to profit from the sale of drugs, which minimizes conflicts of interests, and to varying degrees we have stricter animal welfare practices than other countries,” he mentions.

A challenge now in Sweden, he adds, is the large import of foodstuffs, especially beef, pork, poultry, and mutton, for which the food safety control is less well equipped to be effective at harvest or post-harvest.

Foodborne Illness Stats

Based on an analysis of information submitted by 28 EU member states and four non-member countries on the occurrence of zoonoses and foodborne outbreaks in 2013, the EFSA and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) published on January 28, 2015 that campylobacteriosis was the most commonly reported zoonosis.

As per the EFSA/ECDC’s latest annual report, “European Union Summary Report on Trends and Sources of Zoonoses, Zoonotic Agents and Foodborne Outbreaks in 2013,” Campylobacter, in fact, continued to be the most commonly reported gastrointestinal bacterial pathogen in humans in the EU and has been so since 2005.

Image Credit: FOODSEG

Specifically, the number of reported confirmed cases of human campylobacteriosis was 214,779 in 2013, with an EU notification rate of 64.8 per 100,000 population, which was at the same level as in 2012. Considering the high number of human campylobacteriosis cases, the severity in terms of reported case fatality was deemed to be low (0.05 percent).

Also in 2013, 414 Campylobacter outbreaks were reported, of which 32 were noted as strong-evidence outbreaks. The sources of these strong-evidence outbreaks were noted to be, in decreasing order of importance, broiler meat and products thereof; other, mixed, or unspecified poultry meat and products thereof; and milk and mixed food.

According to EFSA/ECDC, a total of 82,694 confirmed salmonellosis cases were reported by 27 EU member states in 2013, resulting in an EU notification rate of 20.4 cases per 100,000 population. Fifty-nine fatal cases were reported by nine member states among the 14 member states that provided data on the outcome of their cases. This results in an EU case-fatality rate of 0.14 percent among the 40,976 confirmed cases for which this information was available.