Quantifying Human Health Risks Associated with Microbiological Contamination of Fresh Vegetables

Abstract

The baseline incidence of illness associated with fresh produce is low, and fresh produce should be considered as a relatively safe important component of a healthy diet. However, most fresh produce is grown in the open environment and therefore vulnerable to microbiological contamination. Conducting microbial risk assessment for fresh produced is largely hampered by limited data availability combined with large variation and uncertainties. As the major goal of risk assessment is the evaluation of control strategies, simple models can work very good. His chapter provides an example of such simple model. It s further highlighted that outbreaks, and their causes, are rare events. This makes the risk assessment of fresh produce fundamentally different from that of foods of animal origin, which are usually contaminated in a more consistent manner. Risk assessment of fresh produce should shift from establishing baseline risks to quantifying likelihoods of rare events. In order to do so, more data are needed, which can be achieved by in-depth analysis of outbreaks. This requires strong interactions between epidemiologists, (environmental) microbiologists, and the fresh produce processing industry.