Federal authorities have found widespread food safety violations at the Iowa egg farms linked to the nation’s salmonella outbreak, discovering manure in piles up to 8 feet high, rodents, uncaged birds, rusty feed bins, maggots and dead flies “too numerous to count.”
CNN reports that the findings were disclosed in Food and Drug Administration inspection reports for farms operated by Wright County Egg and Quality Egg, which are owned by the same family, as well as Hillandale Farms. The inspections, conducted this month, were prompted by nationwide outbreaks of salmonella resulting from contaminated eggs that have sickened an estimated 1,470 people.
At some Wright County Egg facilities, federal inspectors said they found mounds of manure that prevented doors from closing, possibly allowing rodents and other animals to enter. Inspections at three Hillandale farms found, among other things, rodents and rodent holes, liquid manure leaking into a chicken house and uncaged chickens tracking manure from a manure pit into a caged henhouse.
But the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a food safety advocacy group, called the FDA findings “stomach churning.” The group said the Iowa farms had been given a year to meet new federal egg safety rules that took effect in July mandating pest control and salmonella testing.
“The decrepit conditions in these henhouses reflect the fact that companies know that FDA inspections are so rare — even following the adoption of a new safety regulation — that there is no urgency to fix their buildings and their operations to assure compliance with FDA statutes and regulations,” it said.
Both Wright County Egg said the vast majority of its problems have been, or are being, addressed. Hillandale it is committed to bringing its operations into “full compliance” as soon as possible.
FDA officials have said the new egg safety rules will reduce the possibility of a similar salmonella outbreak in the future.
Separately, the FDA on Monday announced that the salmonella outbreak will not undermine this year’s lines of flu vaccines, The Wall Street Journal reports. The eggs used to make the vaccine come from different farms, and are tested vigorously for pathogens, officials said.
