The Blue Bell Listeria outbreak is another example of how dangerous bacteria such as Listeria and E.coli can survive freezing temperatures. Rare strains of Listeria in Blue Bell ice cream served to patients at Via Christi hospital in Wichita gave five of them listeriosis. Three people died.
The source of the outbreak was traced to a machine at the company’s Brenham, Texas facility that produced single serving ice cream treats such as ice cream bars, sandwiches and individually packaged scoops of ice cream.
Many of the potentially contaminated products were distributed for use in food service, which was also the case with another frozen food outbreak. in 2013.
An E. coli outbreak linked to Farm Rich frozen products sickened 35 people in 19 states in 2013. Most of them were under the age of 21.
The contaminated Farm Rich products included: Mozzarella Bites, Mini Pizza Slices, Mini Quesadillas and Philly Cheese Steaks.They were sold nationwide at retailers including Alco, Food Lion, Food City, Price Chopper Ralph’s, Safeway, Schnuck’s, Supervalu, Target, and Winn Dixie.
About 300,000 of the 10 million pounds of products recalled were sold to schools.
