25/05/2014

European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control

European Food Safety Authority2

European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), Stockholm, Sweden

European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), Parma, Italy

 

Between 1 August 2011 and 31 January 2013, 710 cases of non-travel-related

Salmonella Stanley infections were identified in 10 EU Member States. Epidemiological and microbiological information gathered through a public health, food and veterinary investigation strongly suggested that a contamination in the turkey production chain was the source of the outbreak. Since January 2014, new cases, clusters and epidemics of S. Stanley have been reported in four Member States, all potentially linked to the previous S. Stanley outbreak in 2011–2012. All cases shared the same indistinguishable pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) outbreak strain. The recent cases and changes in the epidemiology of S. Stanley in the EU suggest that the 2011–2012 outbreak strain is still present on the European food market. Therefore, new sporadic cases and outbreaks of S. Stanley are expected, and other European countries may get involved. ECDC encourages Member States to investigate small clusters and outbreaks of domestically acquired S. Stanley infections and report findings through the EPIS-FWD platform. A questionnaire developed for the 2011–2012 outbreak is available through EPIS-FWD. ECDC also encourages all countries to participate in ECDC's molecular surveillance pilot study and submit PFGE patterns of S. Stanley isolates to TESSy. It is important to highlight that persons working in the food industry (from production to catering), as well as consumers, should follow strict personal hygiene measures (e.g. hand washing); the same applies to food hygiene standards; for example when handling raw turkey meat, cross-contamination between ready-to-eat and raw meat should be avoided. ECDC and EFSA recommend that further actions should be taken by risk managers in countries to detect and contain S. Stanley infections in the turkey production chain, thus avoiding the subsequent contamination of turkey meat. If necessary, similar steps should be taken in the broiler production chain.