Food Safety Outbreak: Runoff
The Illinois River in Eastern Oklahoma sometimes has such high levels of bacteria, including E. coli, Salmonella, and Campylobactera, that it can sicken swimmers.
At least 20 triathletes in May 2009 developed gastrointestinal illness after swimming the river, which had more than triple the maximum recommended E. Coli level at the time. The state of Oklahoma blamed the poultry industry for the contamination; in 2005 the state sued poultry companies to limit to the amount of poultry litter that could be dumped on each acre of land in the watershed.
354,000 tons of litter—the droppings and bedding cleaned out of the cages of the 150 million birds raised in the river basin—is spread annually on local fields for fertility and sold as fertilizer.
Cargill, Tyson, and other large poultry companies, defendants in the case, argued that the state could not prove that bacteria in local waterways came from poultry and not wild animals or even human waste treatment plants; that the poultry and farming industries would be harmed if they could not spread litter on fields; that poultry litter could not be regulated with solid waste laws because it had commercial value.
The state’s position was that it had only to show a substantial risk of harm, not prove that chickens were the cause of a given illness or of the algae blooms that sometimes turned the river into a mat of green slime.
As of summer 2010 the judge had still not issued a final ruling in the case.
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Sources
A Quick Swim In The E Coli Contaminated Oklahoma River Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time by E. coli Lawyer, May 28, 2009, accessed August 11, 2010.
Flynn, D. 2010. Poultry Litter Limits Offered by OK. Food Safety News. February 8, accessed August 11, 2010.
Pearson, J. 2010. Open doors and open minds: What will become of water quality efforts? The Tulsa World. August 8.
Killman, C. 2010. Closing arguments wrap up in Oklahoma poultry lawsuit. The Tulsa World. February 18, accessed August 10, 2010.
Update on the Poultry Litigation in Oklahoma, by Linda C. Martin, February 26, 2010, accessed August 10, 2010.
