Dole salads linked to a Listeria outbreak were supposed to have been removed from all store shelves January, 21, but at least one discount grocery store in New Jersey was still selling them on February 1, 2016, Food Poisoning Bulletin learned yesterday. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was notified of the problem last night.
An alert reader contacted Food Poisoning Bulletin yesterday after having second thoughts about the salad purchased on a February 1 shopping trip to the discount grocery store. While at the store, the customer noticed the product code on the salads began with the letter “A” indicating that they were part of the recall. When asked about it, a store manager incorrectly told the customer that the salads were not part of the recall. They are.
Photographs of the products and a February 1 receipt from the store obtained by Food Poisoning Bulletin show Dole brand salads with an “Enjoy By ” date of February 4 and a product code beginning with the letter “A.” Reached for comment today, the manager of the store repeated what he told the customer, that recalled salads were removed January 22 and replaced with a new shipment that was not part of the recall January 25. He said all salads produced by Dole remaining on the floor today have product codes beginning with the letter “B” and the products with “B” codes are not part of the recall.
The following brands of salads may be part of the recall: Dole, Fresh Selections, Simple Truth, Marketside, The Little Salad Bar, and President’s Choice. The product code is found underneath the “Enjoy By” date in the upper right hand corner.
All of the recalled salads were produced at Dole’s plant in Springfield, Ohio. Dole withdrew from the market all salads made there on January 21. On January 27, Dole issued a statement on its website saying it would refer to the withdrawal as a recall, that all products with code beginning with the letter “A” were part of the recall and that the Springfield plant stopped production on January 21.
Case patients in this outbreak have been identified using DNA fingerprinting. These tests show that all 26 patients were sickened by the same outbreak strain of Listeria which has also been isolated from a bagged salad produced at the plant by the Public Health Agency of Canada.
In Canada, the first illness was reported in May 2015, in the U.S. the first illness was reported in June. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) began its investigation in September, but did not announce the outbreak until January 2016 after the source of the problem had been discovered, the agency has stated.
Symptoms of a Listeria infection can take as long as 70 days to develop. They include: nausea and diarrhea followed by fever, headache, stiff neck, confusion, loss of balance, and muscle aches. See a doctor and mention exposure to Listeria through this recalled salad if you ate the recalled product and experience these symptoms.
Those most at risk are young children, seniors, pregnant women and people with compromised immune systems. Among pregnant women, Listeria can cause miscarriage, stillbirth, premature delivery and illness in newborns.
Food Poisoning Bulletin previously reported there were four deaths in Canada associated with the Dole Listeria outbreak. According to the Public Health Agency of Canada, three people sickened with Listeria monocytogenes have died, however their cause of death has not been linked to Listeria.
In the United States, The Centers for Disease Control lists one death associated with the outbreak, however the details of that death have not been released.
We apologize for the error.
