Area of Concern
Sterilex was contacted by a poultry harvest processing plant to assist with Salmonella pathogen reduction pre-chill.
Issue
Pre-chill Pathogen Reduction – Poultry Harvest
Even with appropriate antimicrobial intervention steps in pre-chill, data collected during internal bio-mapping illustrated that the facility was still seeing Salmonella rebound throughout the eviscerating process. The primary areas of concern are the eviscerator, cropper, venters, wash/rinse cabinets, fecal brushes, inside-outside-bird wash (IOBW) and on-line reprocessing (OLR) cabinets and dips.
Background
Reducing the presence of Salmonella and Campylobacter and establishing a low microbial baseline pre-chill is critical to minimizing pathogen loads as product enters the chilling system and moves through the cut-up/debone and packaging process. Reducing Salmonella and Campylobacter pre-chill enhances the facility’s antimicrobial intervention program.
The presence of Salmonella and Campylobacter was evaluated to compare the facility’s current sanitation effectiveness and evaluated again immediately following a shock treatment using Sterilex Ultra Disinfectant Cleaner Solution 1 (Solution 1) and Sterilex Ultra
Activator Solution (Solution 2).
The shock treatment using Sterilex’s Solution 1 and Solution 2 was only applied to the eviscerator, cropper, venters, wash/rinse cabinets and IOBW’s on both lines.
Results
The facility collected bio-mapping data prior to applying a Sterilex shock treatment to gather data on the effectiveness of their current sanitation and antimicrobial intervention program. Sterilex and contract sanitation personnel applied a shock treatment of Sterilex’s Solution 1 and Solution 2 (download the full case study to see application recommendations) and gathered bio-mapping data to show the results following of Sterilex shock treatment.
Bio-mapping results in the week immediately following the Sterilex shock treatment in Zones B and C illustrated a 100% reduction from carcass rinses taken from the areas treated. This indicates that Salmonella presence from equipment is significantly reduced.
