Day 244 - 03 May 96 - Page 10

     
     1        have to be careful about.
     2
     3   MR. MORRIS:  I will move on to the other relevant section of
     4        this book to something about cross contamination.  On page
     5        53, paragraph 4.15, it says, and this would be accepted:
     6
     7        "E.Coli 0157 H7 is isolated from 30.4 per cent of
     8        carcasses of animals upon which the organism had been
     9        previously been isolated" -- this is the carcasses --"from
    10        rectal contents and from 8 per cent of carcasses of animals
    11        adjacent on the production line from which the organism had
    12        not previously been isolated."
    13
    14        Do you have any comment about that, about the adjacent
    15        carcasses being contaminated?
    16        A.  In the context where the production line is mentioned,
    17        it rather does reinforce my point that the cross
    18        contamination is a significant mode of spread of E.Coli and
    19        other pathogenes, and that the larger the operation, the
    20        faster the through-put, the more likely it is that cross
         contamination will occur.
    22
    23   Q.   Yes.  In fact, on page 54, at the top of the page in 4.17:
    24
    25        "Various factors such as the rate of through-put carcass
    26        washing et cetera, will contribute to the spread of
    27        contamination"?
    28        A.  Quite so and it is well demonstrated that rate of
    29        through-put and overall size have crucial impact on the
    30        amount of contaminated meat coming through the system on
    31        the simple basis:  The higher the through-put, the larger
    32        the unit, the higher the level of contamination one would
    33        expect.
    34
    35   Q.   Right.  Moving on to the issue of eliminating, or
    36        attempting to eliminate, contamination during cooking, on
    37        page 73, there are two paragraphs in this report, 6.42 and
    38        6.43.  I am trying just to quote the relevant sentences:
    39
    40        "The standard way of expressing the heat sensitivity of an
         organism is to calculate the 6D value, which is the
    42        combination of time and temperature needed to eliminate a
    43        million cells per gram of food", presumably a million cells
    44        of the organism?
    45        A.  That is right -- well, to achieve -- yes, I will give
    46        you that to save confusion.
    47
    48   Q.   "The results so far indicate that the 6D valued for BTEC"
    49         -- which is the E.Coli we are concerned about  --" in beef
    50        burgers is equivalent to 70 degrees for 2 minutes.  This 
    51        appears to eliminate BTEC. 
    52 
    53        Equivalent values to 70 degrees Centigrade for 2 minutes
    54        are shown on table 6.3.  These values are greater than the
    55        USDA Regulations published in 1993, which were supported by
    56        the FDA Food Co. Published early in 1994.
    57
    58        The CCFRA study showed also that at 70 degrees Centigrade 2
    59        minutes or equivalent values the juices of the burger ran
    60        clear and there were no pink bits inside.  This is in line