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Guest post by Emily Murray

Anyone who has caught a glimpse of the news via TV, the Web or newspaper has undoubtedly seen the headlines lately of recent salmonella outbreaks in the United States and abroad. We can all remember the egg recall in 2010, the alfalfa sprout scare a few months ago and now, the latest, ground turkey outbreak. Of course there have been far more than just these incidents. According to the CDC since 2006, recorded salmonella outbreaks have been on the rise. In 2006 we saw 1, 2007 there were 4, 2008 & 2009 there were 3, 2010 there were 9 and now so far in 2011 we have seen 8.

So it’s becoming increasingly clear that we have a problem, but many are wondering why salmonella infections are becoming a more frequent occurrence. First let’s take a look at the basic facts and origins of salmonella.

Understanding Salmonella
Most of us are exposed to the bacteria salmonella through animal by products and are able to fight off infection with a healthy immune system. However, for the last 100 years at least, we know that people have become sick from its presence in food, in both vegetable and meat products. According to the CDC, there are roughly 40,000 cases of infections each year in the U.S. but naturally there may be even more since many do not report or even realize they have a milder case of the infection.  In addition, about 400 people die in the U.S. as a result of serious infection. The most severe cases are normally seen in young children, the elderly and those who have compromised immune systems.

So why are we hearing more about outbreaks now?

Time of Year
For one thing, it’s a known fact that outbreaks occur more frequently in summer than in the colder months of the year. The recent ground turkey outbreak comes at a time of year that we have unfortunately come to expect. In cases like this, it often takes some time to determine the source of the bacteria and in this time it continues to spread, which can cause an outbreak that tends to make national news. While the meat industry is regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, they are not able to act and enforce a full recall until they are totally sure of the source. In this case, it took a total of 5 months to do this which has, of course, raised more than a few eyebrows.

Antibiotic use in Poultry
This is one aspect that has made treating salmonella a bit of a tricky process in recent years. We are seeing more and more antibiotic resistant types of salmonella emerging and many place the blame on the practice of treating poultry with antibiotics. It’s important to note that this can also happen through mutations of the DNA in the bacteria itself. While many of the problems we see with antibiotic resistant bacteria comes back to our own health system practices, there is also a belief that by giving livestock antibiotics we are perpetuating the problem and seeing more of these resistant outbreaks which are increasingly more difficult to treat. Often these antibiotics are not given to livestock for health ailments but merely to make them grow at a faster rate and as a preventative measure to avoid having to treat them later on. This is why many people are beginning to seek out organic farms that do not partake in these large scale practices.

Meat Packing Process
In recent years, what many refer to as “factory farming” has become a topic of great debate. Essentially, the old-school family farmers are beginning to vanish as large corporate farms have begun replacing them. This means that often livestock are placed in tight quarters with the main priority being profit rather than safety. Of course many argue this is not the case with many large scale farms and there will always be exceptions to the rule. In these large plants, however, preparing the meat for market is often done by a variety of people at a very fast pace which can lead to contamination and human error. It’s actually believed that in the U.S. nearly half of all meat is contaminated with some form of bacteria or another, though scientists are still unsure of the danger these types of bacteria pose to our overall health.

Emily Murray is a health, fitness and relationship blogger as well as a contributing writer for KwikMed, the company recently appointed by Watson Pharmaceuticals as the exclusive online distributor of the new morning after pill, ella.