Food inspection agency admits failure
Problems found at beef plant in August probe
OTTAWA The Canadian Food Inspection Agency admitted Friday it failed to notice during routine inspections that the plant at the centre of Canada’s largest-ever beef recall had not properly implemented its own plan to control food safety risks.
The admission came the same day public health authorities announced a case of illness in Newfoundland linked to tainted meat from the plant. This is the first time a case outside of Alberta has been linked directly to the specific strain of E. coli O157 in meat produced by the XL Foods Inc. plant in Brooks, Alta.
The British Columbia Centre for Disease Control said it is also awaiting the results of genetic testing on a single case that might confirm a link to meat from the Brooks facility.
he CFIA Friday released a summary of what are called Corrective Action Requests given to the company as a result of an in-depth review of the XL Foods plant. The review was triggered by a positive E. coli finding on beef trimmings from the slaughterhouse during routing testing on Sept. 4.
While CFIA said it had verified the company’s plan to control risks, the plan, known as a Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP), “was not being fully implemented or regularly updated,” the agency said. In 2005, HACCP became mandatory in all federally registered meat plants in Canada and is considered the cornerstone of a food-safety system.
This fundamental gap meant the plant wasn’t managing properly its E. coli risks, CFIA said, citing “inconsistent trend analysis on positive samples and no process to include test results from client establishments.”
Basic sanitation and maintenance problems were also found during the in- depth probe, the summary states.
For example, two of 11 water nozzles were clogged in the primary carcass wash area, refrigeration had not been cleaned as frequently as specified, sanitizer was dripping from overhead structures onto products below and the evisceration table thermometer was not functioning properly.
Some employees were not wearing beard nets and “employees sorting beef trim touched contaminated product without following appropriate washing and sanitizing procedures.”
The summary also included a defence as to why government inspectors stationed at plant did not find these problems during routine examination. Forty government inspectors and six veterinarians are stationed full-time at the plant, divided into two groups to cover two production shifts. Up to 4,000 cattle were slaughtered every day.
“In general, routine day-today inspections focus on key hazard control points where food risks are the greatest. Less critical aspects of production and facility maintenance are assessed, but less frequently,” CFIA said.
About 800 products from the plant have been recalled in Canada since Sept. 16.
The recall continued to put Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz and the CFIA on the defensive Friday, a day after the company itself released a statement saying it took “full responsibility” for producing and distributing tainted meat.
Federal opposition parties demanded to know why, after the Americans had closed the border to meat products from the plant, it took Canada two weeks to suspend XL’s licence and shut the plant down.
Interim Liberal leader Bob Rae said “the only conclusion one can come to is that the American authorities appear to have been more concerned about the safety of all American consumers than the minister was concerned about the safety of Canadian consumers.”
Ritz defended the timeline, saying “food safety is a priority for this government.