EC on high listeriosis alert
Supermarkets and spaza shops remove all potentially contaminated products from their shelves
WHILE they might be unregulated, spaza shops in East London have followed their formal counterparts and taken polony off their shelves.
This comes after major retail stores announced they are removing polony and all ready-to-eat meat products from their shelves and will fully refund customers.
The move comes after Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi announced on Sunday that certain meats had been confirmed as the source of a national listeria outbreak, including polony, viennas, russians, frankfurters and other cold processed meats.
The products came from the Enterprise factory in Polokwane, Limpopo, and a Rainbow Chicken factory in Johannesburg.
Major outlets have offered to give customers full refunds when they return the products.
Yesterday a Daily Dispatch team visited a number of chain stores in Vincent, Beacon Bay, Hemingways Mall, the East London CBD, Duncan Village and Mdantsane.
Also visited were various spaza shops in Southernwood, Quigney and Nompumelelo township.
None of the stores or spaza shops visited yesterday still had Enterprise Foods or Rainbow Chicken products in their shelves.
However, some spaza shops in Southernwood were yesterday still selling polony slices that had been removed from their original wrapping, claiming the slices were not from the two companies under the spotlight.
In Buffalo City Metro, the managing director of 13 Spar outlets, Nigel Connellan, yesterday said customers could return to their stores any affected products for a refund.
“All our stores will be offering full refunds even if such products have already been eaten or even if they produce empty packages,” he said.
Frank McGlashlan, who owns the Vincent KwikSpar, said he had since instructed his staff to wash down all cold meat sections and meat cutters.
“The affected products have been zip-tied in plastic bags and are ready to be collected by their companies,” he said.
He added that it would be difficult to reintroduce the affected products to his stores’ shelves as people would be afraid of them for a long time still.
David North of Pick n Pay said all fridges and food preparation areas in their stores had been re-cleaned to prevent any cross-contamination and that recalled meat was being isolated and would be safely destroyed.
Boxer Stores’ communications manager Prenella Govender also confirmed that all their stores were offering refunds.
Despite a huge sign at their Duncan Village store calling for people to return the products for refunds, a manager at the store said no one had done so by late yesterday.
Outside the Hemingways Mall Checkers store, which had already cleared out the products, Loretta Pringle said she hoped the listeria would not affect her daughter’s unborn child.
“I bought polony last week and before I could warn my pregnant daughter she ate it. I hope it’s not true what they say about it being transferred from mother to unborn child,” said Pringle.
Andiswa Hlikihla said listeria should have been investigated a long time ago. “They kept saying these were rumours and now they say we must be careful. I am only worried about the kids because they are the ones who mostly eat these products,” she said.
A total of 180 people have been killed by the disease from last year in South Africa, with nine of those in the Eastern Cape.
Provincial health spokesman Sizwe Kupelo yesterday confirmed that the latest victim of the food borne disease is a five-day-old Duncan Village infant, who died at Frere Hospital late last month.
“Last month three people – a 13-day-old infant from Beacon Bay, a five-day-old infant from Duncan Village and a 40-year-old man, also from Beacon Bay – were admitted.
“Two of them were treated and discharged but, unfortunately, the five-day-old infant did not make it, thus taking the official provincial death toll to nine,” Kupelo said.
Head of the Centre for Enteric Diseases at the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD)‚ Dr Juno Thomas‚ yesterday said there should not be any listeria in a factory that produces processed meat‚ as the products can easily be contaminated with this bacterium.
Listeriosis affects people with weakened immune systems‚ the elderly‚ pregnant women and babies in the womb or infants who contract it from their mothers during birth.
The head of the outbreak response team at the NICD, Dr Kerrigan McCarthy, however, urged people not to panic.
“The vast majority of people who consumed these products will in fact be fine. There is absolutely no reason to worry.”
She elaborated‚ saying: “In the absence of symptoms‚ one should not worry.
“If someone with a weakened immune system has consumed these foods and developed stomach problems or fever and diarrhoea‚ go to the doctor and be tested.”