Analysis Of Prevalence Of Salmonella In Turkey Flocks In The EU
Findings from by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) show that one-third of the European Union’s turkey flocks bred for human consumption had some presence of Salmonella between 2006 and 2007, posing an infection risk for humans.
Salmonella was the second most reported case of food-borne disease in the area studied during 2006, with 160,649 suffering infection from some strain of the pathogen. Slightly less than one-third (30.7%) of the turkey farms tested posted infection risk.
Turkey meat flocks were found to have a high risk of carrying Salmonella, though 13.6% of breeding flocks also showed contamination. The two types of Salmonella (Enteritidis and Typhimurium) most commonly linked to food infections in human were found in 3.8% of flocks assigned to human consumption and in 1.7% of breeding stocks.