(RASFF) Annual Report 2009 - European Commission - Europa

Annual Report 2009
to date is that these symptoms only occurred one or two days after having
consumed the pine seeds. The pine seeds in question originated from China
and Pakistan. In Europe, most pine seeds on the market are produced in
the Mediterranean area, mainly from the Pinus pinea species. The pine nuts
imported from Asia may be harvested from other Pinus species. The substances
that are responsible for the effect have however not yet been identified 17 .
Case 43 relates to high levels of vitamin D in a food supplement that has lead
to hypercalcaemia and kidney failure. The cause of such a high level of vitamin
D was a miscalculation in the production process.
In case 50, Salmonellosis outbreaks in various regions of the UK could be
linked to eggs from a particular flock in Spain, thought to be infected with
Salmonella. As a precaution, eggs from that flock were no longer sold as shell
eggs but were heat treated to destroy any possible presence of Salmonella.
More details in the FSA “Annual Report of Incidents 2009” 18 .
Hepatitis A
Case 48: news notification 09-580
In November 2009, the IHR National Focal Point of Australia notified WHO
of a multi-jurisdictional outbreak of hepatitis A affecting over 250 people
linked to semi-dried tomatoes. After having received an alert through the
INFOSAN network, the Commission made a news notification to draw the
attention of RASFF contact points to this information.
On 29 January 2010, the Commission’s RASFF contact
point received information through its Public
Health Directorate and the EWRS 19 about a hepatitis
A outbreak in France. 43 cases were registered
between November 2009 and February 2010; most
of the cases were epidemiologically linked to semidried
tomatoes.
In addition, authorities in the Netherlands reported
13 cases of hepatitis A which could also be connected
to semi-dried tomatoes. The Netherlands started a
comprehensive tracing investigation into the semidried
tomato products that had been consumed.
From the various investigations it turned out that the products at the source
of the outbreaks were most likely frozen semi-dried tomatoes that had not
undergone any pasteurisation process. The frozen product is bought as an
intermediate product by processors who thaw portions of the product, add
oil, herbs and spices to sell onwards. Samples taken of remaining product or
other batches could not confirm any contamination with hepatitis A in France
40
17 More information on the website of AFSSA: http://www.afssa.fr/Documents/RCCP2009sa0166.pdf
18 http://www.food.gov.uk/multimedia/pdfs/incidents09.pdf
19 Early Warning and Response System on communicable diseases