Spinach contaminated with salmonella bacteria recalled

Bags of spinach contaminated with traces of salmonella bacteria have been recalled by a Californian company.

The company, Metz Fresh, apparently discovered the salmonella during routine testing and has voluntarily recalled the bags of spinach.

Although there have as yet been no cases of salmonella poisoning linked to Metz Fresh spinach, the company is advising anybody who may have purchased any of the spinach to throw it away at once.

The spinach comes in 10-ounce and 16-ounce bags as well as well as in 4-pound cartons and in 2.5-pound four-pack cartons and was distributed to food service companies in the U.S. and Canada, and carries the tracking codes 12208114, 12208214 and 12208314.

The company says that they are currently working in conjunction with the FDA to determine the cause of the problem.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), salmonella bacteria live in the intestinal tracts of humans and animals, including birds and undercooked eggs, poultry or meat are the most common sources of salmonellosis in humans; other foods, such as vegetables, can also be contaminated.

The CDC says salmonella can cause typhoid fever, paratyphoid fever, foodborne illness, diarrhea and abdominal cramps which usually occur within 12 to 72 hours after infection and last for four to seven days.

Most people as a rule recover from salmonella illness without special treatment, but cases of severe diarrhea need medical attention and carry a risk of the infection spreading from the intestines to the bloodstream, a potentially fatal condition.

This latest case comes almost a year after a nationwide outbreak of illness was traced to a batch of bagged California spinach that was tainted with a deadly strain of E. coli bacteria.