http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_tainted_eggs

WASHINGTON – The Iowa egg farm at the center of a massive salmonella outbreak received hundreds of positive results for salmonella in the two years before its eggs sickened more than 1,500 people, congressional investigators said Tuesday.

In a letter to the company's owner, the House Energy and Commerce Committee said its investigators had obtained records showing Wright County Egg received 426 positive results for salmonella between 2008 and 2010. The company recalled 380 million eggs in August after its products were linked to hundreds of illnesses.

The committee said the positive results found over the last two years included 73 samples that were potentially positive for Salmonella Enteritidis, the strain responsible for the recent outbreak.

In the letter to Austin "Jack" DeCoster, the owner of Wright County Egg, committee chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and investigations subcommittee chairman Bart Stupak, D-Mich., said they were concerned that DeCoster did not inform them of the positive results when the panel asked him to provide documents in August. One of the questions the panel asked DeCoster was to show dates and results of all positive findings after microbiological testing.

"When you testify before the committee, we ask that you come prepared to explain why your facilities tested potentially positive for Salmonella Enteritidis contamination on so many occasions, what steps you took to address the contamination identified in these test results, and whether you shared these results with FDA or other federal or state food safety officials," Waxman and Stupak wrote.

DeCoster is scheduled to testify before the panel next week. In a statement attributed to unidentified officials of Wright County Egg, the company said it has already provided some positive results to the committee and the Food and Drug Administration and will continue to do so.

"While we were terribly disappointed to find positive results for Salmonella Enteritidis in eggs, the results affirmed the appropriateness of our voluntary recall," the statement said.

According to the committee, the company received as many as 67 positive results this year alone before the FDA investigation in response to the August recall. That includes one positive result for Salmonella Enteritidis on July 26, less than three weeks before the company recalled the eggs. The recall eventually grew to more than a half-billion eggs and included another company, Hillandale Farms, that also has ties to DeCoster.

The letter does not say how the committee obtained the results or from whom. The testing appears to have been done by a veterinary diagnostic laboratory at Iowa State University, which is listed on reports of the results released by the committee. A spokesman for the laboratory was not immediately available for comment.

The reports also say the results were forwarded to the Agriculture Department's National Veterinary Services Laboratories to confirm the presence of salmonella, indicating some at the department may have known about the instance of salmonella at DeCoster's farm.

A spokeswoman for the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, which oversees the labs, said the agency does thousands of confirmatory tests for universities or states and sends them back to the labs.

"Most of the time we don't even know where the samples came from," said Lyndsay Cole. "Just the presence of salmonella doesn't predict where an outbreak would be."

DeCoster is no stranger to tangling with the government. He has paid millions of dollars in state and federal fines over the years for health, safety, immigration and environmental violations at his farms.

The specific cause of the outbreak is still unknown, and though there is evidence of salmonella at the farms it is still unclear whether it was ever in the company's eggs.

Reports released last month by the FDA show many different possible sources of contamination at both farms, including rodent, bug and wild bird infestation, uncontained manure, holes in walls and other problems that could have led to the outbreak. The FDA also found positive samples of Salmonella Enteritidis.

No deaths have been reported due to the outbreak, but the number of illnesses — which can be life-threatening, especially to those with weakened immune systems — could still increase.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said this is the largest outbreak of this strain of salmonella since the start of the agency's surveillance of outbreaks in the late 1970s. For every case reported, there may be 30 that are unreported, the CDC said.

Thoroughly cooking eggs can kill the bacteria, but health officials recommended that people throw away or return the recalled eggs.

___

Online:

Government's Food safety website: http://www.foodsafety.gov

House Energy and Commerce Committee: http://energycommerce.house.gov

(This version CORRECTS half-million eggs to half-billion eggs.)


WASHINGTON – The Iowa egg farm at the center of a massive salmonella outbreak received hundreds of positive results for salmonella in the two years before its eggs sickened more than 1,500 people, congressional investigators said Tuesday.

In a letter to the company's owner, the House Energy and Commerce Committee said its investigators had obtained records showing Wright County Egg received 426 positive results for salmonella between 2008 and 2010. The company recalled 380 million eggs in August after its products were linked to hundreds of illnesses.

The committee said the positive results found over the last two years included 73 samples that were potentially positive for Salmonella Enteritidis, the strain responsible for the recent outbreak.

In the letter to Austin "Jack" DeCoster, the owner of Wright County Egg, committee chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and investigations subcommittee chairman Bart Stupak, D-Mich., said they were concerned that DeCoster did not inform them of the positive results when the panel asked him to provide documents in August. One of the questions the panel asked DeCoster was to show dates and results of all positive findings after microbiological testing.

"When you testify before the committee, we ask that you come prepared to explain why your facilities tested potentially positive for Salmonella Enteritidis contamination on so many occasions, what steps you took to address the contamination identified in these test results, and whether you shared these results with FDA or other federal or state food safety officials," Waxman and Stupak wrote.

DeCoster is scheduled to testify before the panel next week. In a statement attributed to unidentified officials of Wright County Egg, the company said it has already provided some positive results to the committee and the Food and Drug Administration and will continue to do so.

"While we were terribly disappointed to find positive results for Salmonella Enteritidis in eggs, the results affirmed the appropriateness of our voluntary recall," the statement said.

According to the committee, the company received as many as 67 positive results this year alone before the FDA investigation in response to the August recall. That includes one positive result for Salmonella Enteritidis on July 26, less than three weeks before the company recalled the eggs. The recall eventually grew to more than a half-billion eggs and included another company, Hillandale Farms, that also has ties to DeCoster.

The letter does not say how the committee obtained the results or from whom. The testing appears to have been done by a veterinary diagnostic laboratory at Iowa State University, which is listed on reports of the results released by the committee. A spokesman for the laboratory was not immediately available for comment.

The reports also say the results were forwarded to the Agriculture Department's National Veterinary Services Laboratories to confirm the presence of salmonella, indicating some at the department may have known about the instance of salmonella at DeCoster's farm.

A spokeswoman for the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, which oversees the labs, said the agency does thousands of confirmatory tests for universities or states and sends them back to the labs.

"Most of the time we don't even know where the samples came from," said Lyndsay Cole. "Just the presence of salmonella doesn't predict where an outbreak would be."

DeCoster is no stranger to tangling with the government. He has paid millions of dollars in state and federal fines over the years for health, safety, immigration and environmental violations at his farms.

The specific cause of the outbreak is still unknown, and though there is evidence of salmonella at the farms it is still unclear whether it was ever in the company's eggs.

Reports released last month by the FDA show many different possible sources of contamination at both farms, including rodent, bug and wild bird infestation, uncontained manure, holes in walls and other problems that could have led to the outbreak. The FDA also found positive samples of Salmonella Enteritidis.

No deaths have been reported due to the outbreak, but the number of illnesses — which can be life-threatening, especially to those with weakened immune systems — could still increase.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said this is the largest outbreak of this strain of salmonella since the start of the agency's surveillance of outbreaks in the late 1970s. For every case reported, there may be 30 that are unreported, the CDC said.

Thoroughly cooking eggs can kill the bacteria, but health officials recommended that people throw away or return the recalled eggs.

___

Online:

Government's Food safety website: http://www.foodsafety.gov

House Energy and Commerce Committee: http://energycommerce.house.gov

(This version CORRECTS half-million eggs to half-billion eggs.)

source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_tainted_eggs

Strange Worms Discovered Eating Dead Whales

Some truly strange creatures can be found on the ocean seafloor, and boneworms are among the most bizarre — they have no eyes or mouth and feast on the bones of dead whale carcasses.

Now scientists have identified even more species of this recently discovered worm, and their analysis reveals additional clues to when the creatures first evolved.

Boneworms, belonging to the genus Osedax, were first discovered back in 2002 off the coast of California in an underwater valley called the Monterey Canyon. Since then, the researchers that made the find have been uncovering details about the life cycle and eating habits of these worms.

Between 2004 and 2008, the team, from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, sank five whale carcasses into the bay, providing a cornucopia for their research subjects.

They found that the worms begin life as microscopic larvae floating through the deep ocean. When the larvae encounter a dead animal, such as a whale or elephant seal, they settle onto its bones. The worms then sprout up, looking a bit like tiny trees. At one end are root-like structures that grow into the bone. The scientists suspect that bacteria in these roots break down proteins within the bone, which supply nutrients for the worms. At the other end are feathery appendages called "palps," which take in oxygen.

When these worms sexually mature, they all turn into females. But larvae that land on the female boneworm's palps develop into male worms, although they remain microscopic in size. The male worms fertilize the females' eggs, which are then released to start the cycle over.

Initially, the researchers identified five species of boneworms. In the new study, they found an additional 12 species from analyses of the worm's DNA.

Not all boneworms look alike. Their feathery palps can be red, pink, green or even striped. And some don't have feathers at all.

The researchers also attempted to calculate how long these worms have been around by estimating how fast their DNA mutates. With one particular estimate for the mutation rate, they hypothesized that the worms evolved 45 million years ago, which is around the time that large whales first appear in the fossil record. A second, slower estimate suggests that the worms may have evolved 130 million years ago, in which case they could have eaten the bones of ancient sea reptiles.

Further study of whale and marine reptile fossils for the remains of worm roots could help pin down the time period in which the worms evolved, the researchers suggest.

The study was published Nov. 10 in the journal BMC Biology.

source: http://www.livescience.com/animals/091117-boneworms-species.html

Emerging Bol-Anon

Emerging Bol-Anon

Eat for Health and High Energy

February 14, 2010

Eat for Health and High Energy
By Brian Tracy

The first rule for great health is that you should eat the right foods, and you should eat fewer of them. Your body is very much like a complex production process, and every bite you eat has a chemical effect on your health and well being. By eating excellent foods, and in the right proportions, you can dramatically increase the quality and length of your life.

The Keys to Greater Longevity
Fortunately, we know almost everything we need to know about the proper diet. The eating habits of the Hunza Tribe in Southern Russia, people live to be 110 to 120 years old. People who have been put on the Hunza diet in downtown London, England, have begun to almost immediately experience the same levels of health, energy and longevity as the Hunzas in the mountains of Russia.

Variety is Essential
The very best diet for high levels of fitness and long life consist of lean source proteins, fruits, vegetables and whole grain products, and lots of water. The diets they studied were extremely varied, and the sources of these foods came from many different areas, but they all contained very much the same ingredients.

Two Foods to Avoid
The two foodstuffs that seem to be associated with the most health problems are fats and carbohydrates. In moderation, they are a regular part of a normal diet. But in excess, they cause poor health, weight gain and obesity. Eating too many fats and carbohydrates decreases energy and causes a variety of physical ailments, including diabetes, heart attacks and strokes.


The Real Reason for Obesity
People who eat too many carbohydrates develop two common conditions. In men, they develop carbohydrate belly, of the huge stomach you see on men who eat too much of the wrong foods. On women, they develop carbohydrate thighs, or what some people call cellulite, which is another word for fat. In America today, fully 50 million people are officially characterized as obese. This means that they are 20% or more above their ideal bodily weight, according to height and weight charts. And the primary reason for obesity is too many fats and carbohydrates, and too few lean source proteins, fruits, vegetables and whole grain products.

The Three White Poisons
To be really healthy, and live a long happy life, you need to eliminate what I call the three white poisons as well. These three white poisons are salt, sugar and white flour products. Each of them is bad for you and none of them is necessary for optimal health.

You are Sweet Enough
Recent research says that sugar is the main culprit in weight gain and poor health. Sugar products make you fat, tire you out, rot your teeth, ruin your appetite for nutritious foods and shorten life. And the fact is that you actually require no sugar at all in your diet.

Eat to Live
The rule for long life is that you should eat to live rather than live to eat. The best health rule for health, fitness, and high levels of energy can be summarized in five words: "Eat less and exercise most."

Action Exercise
Write down everything you eat for a week, look at what you are eating and how much. You will probably be shocked to see everything you put in your body, and how a lot of the food is carbohydrates, sugar, and processed food.

Vancouver 2010 Host Videos

Vancouver2010.com Olympic Host Videos give you a vivid taste of the 2010 Winter Games experience, providing medal results, arts and entertainment highlights and VANOC updates every day of the Games. Whether you’re watching from near or far, the Host Videos deliver the fun and excitement of Vancouver 2010.

source; http://www.vancouver2010.com/olympic-news/host-videos/