Food Safety Outbreak: Pot Pies
In October 2007, salmonella in ConAgra’s Banquet Pot Pies, as well as the store brand pot pies it also produced, sickened 475 people in 35 states. At least 62 people had to be sent to the hospital.
After the first few dozen people fell ill, ConAgra issued a health alert, warning consumers not to eat pies labeled with certain codes. For a few days, the company tried to avoid a full scale recall, even as health officials formally requested one.
The company also attempted to shift blame for the illnesses from its own production processes to consumer behavior. If consumers would cook the pies properly to a high temperature, any microbes present would be killed.
As the outbreak spread, however, the company was unable to prevent a recall.
For ConAgra it was the second recall of the year. Several months earlier the company had to recall its Peter Pan and Great Value (Wal-mart’s house brand) peanut butter, for salmonella contamination that caused over 400 people in 44 states to fall ill.
In that case, officials had visited the plant in 2005 after receiving complaints about salmonella, but when the company refused to provide documents, the inspectors did not follow up. The peanut butter was returned to store shelves just weeks before the pot pie fiasco hit.
The pot pie recall was estimated to cost ConAgra $30 million.
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Sources
Marler, B. 2007. ConAgra Foods resumes making Banquet pot pies - spends $30 million on recall. Marler Blog, posted November 14, accessed July 29, 2010
Martin, A. 2009. Fallout Widens as Buyers Shun Peanut Butter. New York Times. February 6.
Williamson, E. 2007. FDA Was Aware of Dangers to Food: Outbreaks were not preventable, officials say. Washington Post, April 23.
