Reducing levels of high-risk Salmonella serotypes in raw poultry parts could help improve public health and reduce salmonellosis cases, according to a new risk assessment from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Our assessment shows that most of the risk in raw poultry products can likely be found in a few poultry parts that have relatively high levels of Salmonella and probably high-virulent serotypes, explained Matthew Stasiewicz, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Associate Professor of Applied Food Safety.
According to Stasiewicz, using Salmonella risk management strategies that target high levels of high-virulent serotypes would help the industry manage the Salmonella risk in finished products by reducing the highest risk outcomes.
Additionally, the study supports the idea that managing low-virulent serotypes would limit improvements in public health.
This is important, he explained, because regulatory policies focused on Salmonella prevalence only could encourage reductions of low-virulent Salmonella, which could have no effect or may potentially increase high-virulent serotypes.
Public data shows that high-levels of high-virulent serotypes are rare…
