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The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is announcing the availability of its updated "Best Practices Guidance for Controlling Listeria monocytogenes in Retail Delicatessens".
The best- practices guidance discusses steps that retailers can take to prevent certain ready-to-eat (RTE) foods that are prepared or sliced in retail delicatessens (delis) and consumed in the home, such as deli meats and deli salads, from becoming contaminated with L. monocytogenes and thus a source of listeriosis.
FSIS encourages retailers to review the guidance and evaluate the effectiveness of their retail practices and intervention strategies in reducing the risk of listeriosis to consumers from RTE meat and poultry deli products.
FSIS updated this guidance based on comments received during the public comment period which closed on June 20, 2014. FSIS made the following changes to the guidance in response to comments: Clarified that food processing equipment should be disassembled during cleaning and sanitizing, added a recommendation that retailers scrub surfaces during cleaning to prevent biofilm formation, and clarified that retailers should rotate (change) sanitizers to help prevent L. monocytogenes from establishing niches in the environment and forming biofilms.
Thursday June 11, 2015/ Food Safety and Inspection Service/ United States.
www.fsis.usda.gov
