Prevalence and characterization of the seven major serotypes of Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) in veal calves slaughtered in France.

Shiga toxin (Stx)-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) belonging to the "top 7″ serotypes (i.e. O157:H7, O26:H11, O45:H2, O103:H2, O111:H8, O121:H19 and O145:H28) are considered as the main pathogenic enterohemorrhagic E.

High Fecal Prevalence of -Positive in Veal Calves at Slaughter in France.

The aim of this study was to determine the percentage of healthy veal calves carrying -positive strains at the time of slaughter in France. Fecal samples were selectively screened for -positive isolates using media supplemented with colistin. Screening for genes was also carried out in isolates resistant to critically important antimicrobials used in human medicine recovered from the same fecal samples.

Distribution of Escherichia coli O157:H7 in ground beef: Assessing the clustering intensity for an industrial-scale grinder and a low and localized initial contamination.

Undercooked ground beef is regularly implicated in food-borne outbreaks involving pathogenic Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli. The dispersion of bacteria during mixing processes is of major concern for quantitative microbiological risk assessment since clustering will influence the number of bacteria the consumers might get exposed to as well as the performance of sampling plans used to detect contaminated ground beef batches. In this study, batches of 25kg of ground beef were manufactured according to a process mimicking an industrial-scale grinding with three successive steps: primary grinding, mixing and final grinding.