How does food become contaminated with E. coli?
Slaughter Management Ground beef is a significant source of infection because of meat handling procedures. E. coli O157:H7 has been detected in the intestinal samples of 1% of healthy cattle. When the cattle are slaughtered, there is some opportunity for intestinal contents to contact other tissues. Even if just a small portion is contaminated, it is easily spread throughout the tissues by the grinding process. If properly cooked, there is no danger of infection, but a lot of people enjoy their hamburgers a little pink on the inside. When incompletely cooked, the bacteria survive and infect. Because the meat of many carcasses is mixed in the production of ground beef, it only takes a few cattle to be infected to contaminate a large amount of meat (Boyce et al, 1995).
