Quotable Quotes:
"You're going to pay a little bit more; So the consumer has to decide if it is worth 6 cents to 12 cents more for me to feed my family the safest, highest quality product that is out there." David A. Corbin,  Chairman of the Sadex Corporation

"Omaha Steaks has always felt strongly that irradiation of all our ground beef products was an added level of food safety that we wanted to provide our customers,"  Beth Weiss, spokesperson for Omaha Steaks

To the best of our knowledge this is the first published report for actual mutagenicity testing of 2-DCB in human cells.  The results are negative, which agrees with the results obtained in bacterial mutagenicity tests previously completed in Europe, the Eastern Regional Research Center and at Kansas State University. Christopher H. Sommers, Ph. D; U.S. Dept of Agriculture, Eastern Regional Research Center, Wyndmoor, PA 19038 USA

In This Update:

Toxicology Testing of the Unique Radiolytic Product 2-Dodecylcyclobutanone

Sadex Group Revives Sioux City Food Irradiation Facility
Galveston Inmates File Suit Over Taco Beef
Marcotte Named Co-Chair of Methyl Bromide Technical Options Committee

Included in the paper is data from mutagenicity testing of 2-DCB in human TK6 lymphoblasts, an FDA recommended version of the Mouse Lymphoma Assay.  To the best of our knowledge this is the first published report for actual mutagenicity testing of 2-DCB in human cells.  The results are negative, which agrees with the results obtained in bacterial mutagenicity tests previously completed in Europe, the Eastern Regional Research Center and at Kansas State University.

Abstract:

Treatment of foods containing fatty acids, including meat and poultry, with ionizing radiation can lead to the formation of a class of chemicals called 2-alkykyclobutanones (2-ACBs) that are unique to irradiated foods. The major 2-ACD formed in irradiated meat is 2-dodecylcyclobutanone (2-DCB), which is formed by the radiolysis of palmitic acid. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommends that indirect food additives consumed in quantities greater than 1.5 ug per day be tested for safety. On average, approximately 6.0 ug2-DCB is present an irradiated, and then cooked, 125 gram ground beef patty, which exceeds the 1.5 ug/day limit. Because of the availability of irradiated ground beef as past of the National School Lunch Program in the U.S. “consumer groups” opposed to food irradiation have requested that 2-DCB be tested in appropriate genotoxicity assays, even though irradiated meats have been extensively tested for safety in animal studies, and have been approved by the FDA for consumption by humans. In order to address the question of 2-DCB genotoxicity the purified compound was tested in 6 genotoxicity tests including bacterial reverse mutation assays, a 5-fluro-urucil mutagenesis assay, the yeast DEL assay, the Pro-Tox^TM Assay, and for the formation of 6-thioguanine resistant mutants in human TK6 lymphoblasts. No 2-DCB induced rnutagenesis was observed in any of the test systems, both with and without exogenous metabolic activation.

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Sadex Group Revives Food Irradiation Facility; (December 30, 2005) Knight-Ridder Tribune; Joe Ruff, Omaha World-Herald, Nebraska

An investment team headed by a Texas man is reviving technology known as SureBeam at a plant in Sioux City, Iowa. The team believes there is a growing market for using electron beams to kill bacteria in ground beef and other products.

"We want this to become the 'Intel Inside' of food products," said David Corbin, chairman of the Sadex Corp. Corbin, of Fort Worth, Texas, and 12 other Sadex shareholders have been licensed to use the Surebeam technology by Titan Corp., which developed the electronic pasteurization method of killing E. coli, Salmonella and other food-borne pathogens. The Sadex group also bought the equipment for an undisclosed price.

Titan, now part of L-3 Communications group, had spun off the technology into a company called Surebeam Corp. of San Diego, Calif., which opened the plant in 2000 and raised $67 million in an initial public offering in March 2001. Surebeam went bankrupt in January 2004, however. Sadex reopened Surebeam's Sioux City plant in June. 

Corbin, who also had invested in the SureBeam company, said SureBeam officials made some mistakes, including spending too much money on marketing and trying to attract a wide range of meat- processing companies. Corbin said irradiated meats also will appear on some grocery shelves in the coming weeks.

Irradiation of meat received a lot of attention when it first was introduced, but attention has waned, Corbin said. "The biggest thing that made it disappear was SureBeam went bankrupt. A large number of producers in the Midwest used Sioux City to get their products irradiated." Omaha Steaks used Surebeam for its ground beef products, but switched to Food Technology Service Inc. of Mulberry, Fla., when Surebeam went bankrupt.

 "Omaha Steaks has always felt strongly that irradiation of all our ground beef products was an added level of food safety that we wanted to provide our customers," spokeswoman Beth Weiss said in an e-mail. Florida obviously is farther away than Sioux City, but the arrangement has worked well and Omaha Steaks currently plans to stay with Food Technology, Weiss said.

Irradiated items such as sterilized medical equipment have been around for more than 30 years, and since the 1960s food products such as wheat and potatoes have had various federal approval dates for irradiation. The process, which also can extend shelf life, was approved in 1986 for pork, spices, fruits and vegetables. Poultry received full approval for irradiation in 1992.

Irradiated beef has been on supermarket shelves since 2000. And the U.S. Department of Agriculture began offering irradiated beef in national school lunch and other federal food programs in 2004.

The USDA and the Food and Drug Administration have deemed irradiated food safe. Advocates argue the technology is one more step toward food safety.

All irradiated foods must be properly labeled. Products treated in Sioux City will receive a Sadex or a SureBeam logo, depending on what clients want to use. Corbin said the irradiation process at his plant could add 6 cents to 12 cents per pound to the cost of ground beef.

"You're going to pay a little bit more," Corbin said. "So the consumer has to decide if it is worth 6 cents to 12 cents more for me to feed my family the safest, highest quality product that is out there."

Harlan Clemmons, vice president and general manager of Sadex, said some people might hesitate to buy irradiated meat, but his company expects wider acceptance as the process becomes more common. Pasteurization of milk encountered similar, early skepticism, he said. "Now it is a readily accepted thing to do to milk, just because it makes milk safer," Clemmons said. In its irradiation process, Sadex passes meat, fruits, vegetables, cosmetics, spices, pet foods, veterinarian supplies and other products under an electron beam to kill harmful bacteria.

Many medical device manufacturers run their own irradiation facilities. Other companies in the irradiation business include Steris Corp. of Mentor, Ohio, and Sterigenics International of Oak Brook, Ill.

Cliff Albertson, general manager and chief operating officer of Huisken Meats in Sauk Rapids, Minn., said his company was the first in the country to irradiate ground beef - on May 16, 2000 - and it used SureBeam. When SureBeam went out of business, Huisken Meats turned to Texas A&M for its irradiation services, Albertson said. Huisken Meats currently is considering whether to use Sadex Corp. in Sioux City, Albertson said. "It's a wonderful technology," Albertson said.

Clemmons said the Sioux City plant is running about three-quarters of a full shift, with four full-time workers and 11 planned. There will be enough work to add more shifts in the future, Clemmons said. "I think we can become a 24/7 operation."

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A lawsuit filed by 124 present and former county jail inmates claims that the prisoners who ate tacos in March 2004 picked up something not on the menu - food poisoning.
 

The story says that the suit alleges that "inappropriate food handling" caused violent illness among prisoners who ate the tacos served to inmates March 23, 2004.
Galveston County Sheriff Gean Leonard was cited as saying he could not comment on the lawsuit because he had not been served with a copy.
 

The lawsuit, which seeks an unspecified amount of damages, also names ABL Management as a defendant. ABL is the contractor that provides food for inmate meals.
The suit accuses jailers of "failing to properly clean and disinfect preparation surfaces and materials" and of improperly cooking the meat that went into the tacos.
As a result, the lawsuit alleges, bacteria in the food caused rampant, severe illness among those who ate the tacos.
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