Les Champignons .

REVIEW Public Health

Campylobacter Contamination in Retail Poultry Meats and By-Products in the World: A Literature Survey

Hodaka SUZUKI1)* and Shigeki YAMAMOTO1)

1)Division of Biomedical Food Research, National Institute of Health Sciences, Kamiyoga 1–18–1, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo 158–8501, Japan

(Received 8 September 2008/Accepted 24 October 2008)

ABSTRACT. Campylobacter species are common bacterial pathogens associated with human gastroenteritis worldwide. In North America, Europe and Japan, campylobacteriosis is one of the leading food-borne bacterial illnesses and the consumption of poultry meats and/or by-products is suspected a major cause of the illness. In this survey, we summarized the research papers describing Campylobacter con- tamination of retail poultry meats and by-products in various countries of the world. In most of the countries, a majority of retail poultry meats and by-products were contaminated with Campylobacter spp. C. jejuni was usually the dominant Campylobacter species isolated from retail poultry and C. coli was less frequently isolated, although the ratio of C. coli to C. jejuni was considerably different among the countries. However, in Thailand and South Africa, C. coli was the dominant Campylobacter species isolated from retail poultry. A large portion of retail poultry was contaminated with Campylobacter spp. in the world; therefore, further trials are required for finding proper countermeasures and attention should be paid for the sanitary handling of poultry products.

KEY WORDS: Campylobacter, chicken, food microbiology, food safety.

Campylobacter species are common bacterial pathogens associated with human gastroenteritis in both developed and developing countries [12, 55, 80]. Contaminated raw or undercooked poultry meats and/or by-products are particu- larly important to cause food-borne campylobacteriosis in humans [11]. There are many reports describing Campylo- bacter contamination in retail poultry meats and/or by-prod- ucts in the world. Recently, we summarized the Japanese situation of Campylobacter contamination in retail poultry meats and by-products elsewhere [73] and concluded that 58.8% of retail poultry meats and 60.3% of poultry by-prod- ucts, on the average, were contaminated with Campylo- bacter spp. in Japan. For comparing the contamination levels among the countries or areas, we performed a litera- ture survey of Campylobacter contamination in retail poul- try worldwide in this article.

METHODS

We searched for the papers which described the retail poultry meats and by-products contaminated with Campylo- bacter spp. by using the combination of two sets of key- words, which were “Campylobacter” and “poultry or chicken”. The databases, such as JSTPlus and JMedPlus provided by the Japan Science and Technology Agency, PubMed provided by the United States National Library of Medicine, ScienceDirect provided by Elsevier, and Japana Centra Revuo Medicina provided by the Japan Medical Abstract Society, were used. These databases were searched from July to August, 2007. The papers, which

*CORRESPONDENCE TO: SUZUKI, H., Division of Biomedical Food Research, National Institute of Health Sciences, Kamiyoga 1– 18–1, Setagaya-ku, Tokyo 158–8501, Japan.

e-mail: hodaka@nihs.go.jp

J. Vet. Med. Sci. 71(3): 255–261, 2009

were published from 2002 to the time of the searches, describing Campylobacter contamination in retail poultry, but not in poultry at farms or at processing plants, were col- lected. Totally 107 papers were collected but 32 out of 107 papers concerning the Japanese situation were summarized in our previous paper, as mentioned above. Hence, in this article, we summarized other 75 papers, together with the citation of our previous paper for the Japanese situation.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Detection methods of Campylobacter spp: For detecting Campylobacter spp. from food stuffs, several official proto- cols are presented in the world, such as ISO method (ISO 10272), FDA-CFSAN (BAM) method, UK (PHLS) method, etc. In addition to these official protocols, many other meth- ods were reported in many research papers.

The investigations reported by the papers cited in this article employed several different methods for detecting Campylobacter spp. For example, the detection methods used were mainly culture methods, such as, the qualitative (enrichment) method, most probable number (MPN) method, and direct plating method; and molecular biological methods and immunochemical methods in combination with or without enrichment culture. The sample preparation methods used were mainly to homogenize the sample, to rinse the sample, and to immerse the sample directly in the culture media or combinations of the latter two but swabs of the sample or drip fluids from the sample were also used in some investigations. The enrichment media employed were mainly Bolton broth and Preston broth, but Exeter broth, which are included in PHLS method, or Park and Sanders broth, which are included in ISO method, or Campylobacter enrichment broth (CEB) were used in several investigations.



256 H. SUZUKI AND S. YAMAMOTO

The isolation media employed were mainly charcoal cefaperazone deoxycholate agar (CCDA) plates, but Kar- mali agar plates, which are included in ISO method, or Abeyta-Hunt(-Bark) agar plates, which are included in BAM method, or Preston agar plates were also used in sev- eral investigations. Moreover, the detailed conditions for enrichment and isolation culture, the methods for identifica- tion, and the initial sample weights for sample preparation differed among investigations. However, these differences in the methods were not considered, although the perfor- mance of enrichment and isolation media used to detect Campylobacter spp. was considerably different (5).

Prevalence of Campylobacter spp. in retail poultry meats and by-products: We classified into 5 categories; poultry meats, poultry by-products, frozen poultry meats, frozen poultry by-products, and ground poultry meats (Table 1). In several investigations, Campylobacter contamination was examined in each part of poultry meats and/or by-products separately, such as breasts, thighs, wings, fillets, gizzards, livers, hearts, etc. However, in a majority of investigations, the portions of poultry meats and by-products examined were not specified or whole poultry carcasses, not poultry portions, were examined. Therefore, we just categorized as poultry

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