Salmonella Rissen | The International Outbreak Museum

Outbreak: Lian How White Pepper
Product: White Pepper	Investigation Start Date: 03/02/2009
Location: Multi-state outbreak–OR, CA, NV, WA	Etiology: Salmonella Rissen
Earliest known case onset date: 11/01/2008	Latest case onset date: 05/27/2009
Confirmed / Presumptive Case Counts: 87 / 0	Positive Samples (Food): 33
Hospitalizations: 8	Deaths: 0

Tray of accoutrements for Phở (Vietnamese noodle soup) including a shaker of the infamous Lian How white pepper.
Bulk spice storage of Lian How products at a restaurant.
Recall notice for many Lian How products, including white and black ground pepper.
Lian How white and black pepper containers that yielded positive Salmonella cultures; they now live in the museum.
Up close shot of the contaminated Lian How ground white pepper.
An orange added to illustrate the actual size of a 5lb. container of ground pepper.
The epidemic curve for S. Rissen white pepper outbreak; note date of recall and slow dissipation of cases are products are slowly identified in use at restaurant.
A graph depicts the background rate of the most common Salmonella serotype (Enteritidis) and the extremely low background rate of Salmonella Rissen infections in the United States.
Though a rare serotype, Salmonella Rissen did trend upward in the United States two years before this outbreak began.
List of ingredients.
One case had Salmonella cultured from an amputated toe; a replica exists in the museum.

OUTBREAK SUMMARY:

Salmonella Rissen is a very rare serotype in the US. When Oregon, California, and Nevada all reported it within days of each other, it began a coordinated investigation between those states (later to be joined by Washington and Idaho). This outbreak focused FDA attention on the role spices may … Continue Reading ››