 | |
| Location | European Economic Area (EEA), South Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan |
|---|---|
| Cause | Insecticide used inside Dutch poultry farms |
The 2017 fipronil eggs contamination is an incident in Europe and Asia involving the spread of fipronil insecticide which contaminated human-consumed chicken eggs and egg products.
Chicken eggs were found to contain fipronil and distributed to 15 European Union countries, Switzerland, and Hong Kong. [1] [2] Approximately 700,000 eggs are thought to have reached shelves in the UK alone. [3] Fipronil contaminated eggs may have been sold for a long time prior to the discovery of high levels. [4] Fipronil was used in a remedy to destroy the poultry mite. [5]
Authorities in the Netherlands were alerted by an anonymous source in November 2016 that fipronil was being used in poultry farms, but failed to communicate the findings. [6] [7] In July/August 2017 millions of chicken eggs were blocked from sale or withdrawn from the market in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and France after elevated levels of fipronil were discovered by the Dutch food and product safety board. [4] About 180 Dutch farms were temporarily shut down. [4] In early August, Aldi reported removing all eggs for sale in their German stores as a precaution. [8]
Because the use of fipronil is illegal in the production of food for human consumption in Europe, a criminal investigation was initiated. [4] [9]
Early investigation led to two companies: ChickFriend, a provider of pest control services in the Netherlands, suspected of knowingly using and selling DEGA-16 mixed with fipronil to hundreds of chicken farmers, and Poultry Vision in Belgium, accused of selling DEGA-16 mixed with fipronil to ChickFriend. DEGA-16 is a cleaning and sanitising natural product that is approved to clean chicken stables. The Dutch owners of ChickFriend were arrested during a large scale operation conducted by Dutch law enforcement agencies on 10 August. [10] [11] The first results of an investigation by Belgian police led to the discovery of 6 cubic metres (210 cu ft) of fipronil that Poultry Vision had imported from a chemical manufacturing company in Romania. [12] [13]
The Dutch Safety Board announced on 8 August 2017 that an official investigation has been initiated. [14] [15] On 21 April 2021 the two main suspects were each sentenced to one year incarceration. [16]
In South Korea, authorities found fipronil-contaminated eggs, which were produced in Namyangju, on 14 August 2017. [17] E-mart, Homeplus, and Lotte Mart stopped selling eggs temporarily on the same day. [18] [19]
Scientific tests carried in Germany on imported eggs to Malta found that eight of twenty had traces of fipronil, and the Maltese were informed to take measures in limiting the consumption to not more than two eggs per day. [20]
The maximum residue limit (MRL) of fipronil in eggs is set at the detection limit of 0.005 mg/kg within the European Union, as is outlined in Regulation (EC) No 396/2005 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 February 2005. [21] Fipronil is classed as a WHO Class II moderately hazardous pesticide, and has a rat acute oral LD50 of 97 mg/kg.
The Dutch food and product safety board (NVWA) reported that the test results of one batch of eggs originating from one poultry farm in the Netherlands exceeded the threshold of 0.72 mg/kg. Eggs containing fipronil values above this threshold could have possible negative health effects. [22]
Poultry are domesticated birds kept by humans for the purpose of harvesting useful animal products such as meat, eggs or feathers, and the practice of raising poultry is known as poultry farming. These birds are most typically members of the superorder Galloanserae (fowl), especially the order Galliformes. The term also includes waterfowls of the family Anatidae and other flying birds that are kept and killed for their meat such as the young pigeons, but does not include wild birds hunted for food known as game or quarry.
The chicken is a domesticated species that arose from the red junglefowl, originally from Southeast Asia. They have also partially hybridized with other wild species of junglefowl. Rooster and cock are terms for adult male birds, and a younger male may be called a cockerel. A male that has been castrated is a capon. An adult female bird is called a hen, and a sexually immature female is called a pullet. Humans keep chickens primarily as a source of food or as pets. Traditionally, they were also bred for cockfighting, which is still practiced in some places. Chickens domesticated for meat are broilers, and for eggs, they are layers.
The Silkie is a breed of chicken named for its atypically fluffy plumage, which is said to feel like silk and satin. The breed has several other unusual qualities, such as black skin and bones, blue earlobes, and five toes on each foot, whereas most chickens have only four. They are often exhibited in poultry shows, and also appear in various colors. In addition to their distinctive physical characteristics, Silkies are well known for their calm and friendly temperament. It is among the most docile of poultry. Hens are also exceptionally broody, and care for young well. Although they are fair layers themselves, laying only about three eggs a week, they are commonly used to hatch eggs from other breeds and bird species due to their broody nature. Silkie chickens have been bred to have a wide variety of colors which include but are not limited to: Black, Blue, Buff, Partridge, Splash, White, Lavender, Paint and Porcelain.
Salmonellosis is a symptomatic infection caused by bacteria of the Salmonella type. It is also a food-borne disease and these are defined as diseases, usually either infectious or toxic in nature, caused by agents that enter the body through the ingestion of food. In humans, the most common symptoms are diarrhea, fever, abdominal cramps, and vomiting. Symptoms typically occur between 12 hours and 36 hours after exposure, and last from two to seven days. Occasionally more significant disease can result in dehydration. The old, young, and others with a weakened immune system are more likely to develop severe disease. Specific types of Salmonella can result in typhoid fever or paratyphoid fever.
The Barnevelder is a Dutch breed of domestic chicken. It resulted from cross-breeding between local Dutch chickens and various "Shanghai" birds imported from Asia to Europe in the later part of the nineteenth century; these may have been of Brahma, Cochin or Croad Langshan type. It is named for the town and gemeente (municipality) of Barneveld, in Gelderland in the central Netherlands. The hens are good layers of large brown eggs and, unlike some other breeds, continue to lay well during winter.
Free-range eggs are eggs produced from birds that may be permitted outdoors. The term "free-range" may be used differently depending on the country and the relevant laws, and is not regulated in many areas.
Fipronil is a broad-spectrum insecticide that belongs to the Phenylpyrazole chemical family. Fipronil disrupts the insect central nervous system by blocking the ligand-gated ion channel of the GABAA receptor and glutamate-gated chloride (GluCl) channels. This causes hyperexcitation of contaminated insects' nerves and muscles. Fipronil's specificity towards insects is believed to be due to its greater binding affinity to the GABAA receptors of insects, than to those of mammals, and to its action on GluCl channels, which do not exist in mammals. As of 2017, there did not appear to be significant resistance among fleas to fipronil.
Chick culling or unwanted chick killing is the process of separating and killing unwanted chicks for which the intensive animal farming industry has no use. It occurs in all industrialised egg production, whether free range, organic, or battery cage. However, some certified pasture-raised egg farms are taking steps to eliminate the practice entirely. Worldwide, around 7 billion male chicks are culled each year in the egg industry. Because male chickens do not lay eggs and only those in breeding programmes are required to fertilise eggs, they are considered redundant to the egg-laying industry and are usually killed shortly after being sexed, which occurs just days after they are conceived or after they hatch. Some methods of culling that do not involve anaesthetics include: cervical dislocation, asphyxiation by carbon dioxide, and maceration using a high-speed grinder. Maceration is the primary method in the United States. Maceration is often a preferred method over carbon dioxide asphyxiation in western countries as it is often considered as "more humane" due to the deaths occurring immediately or within a second.
The Polish or Poland is a European breed of crested chickens known for its remarkable crest of feathers. The oldest accounts of these birds come from The Netherlands; their exact origins are unknown, however. In addition to combs, they are adorned with large crests that nearly cover the entirety of the head. This crest limits their vision, and as a result can affect their temperament. Thus, though normally tame, they may be timid and easily frightened.
In China, the adulteration and contamination of several food and feed ingredients with inexpensive melamine and other compounds, such as cyanuric acid, ammeline and ammelide, are common practice. These adulterants can be used to inflate the apparent protein content of products, so that inexpensive ingredients can pass for more expensive, concentrated proteins. Melamine by itself has not been thought to be very toxic to animals or humans except possibly in very high concentrations, but the combination of melamine and cyanuric acid has been implicated in kidney failure. Reports that cyanuric acid may be an independently and potentially widely used adulterant in China have heightened concerns for both animal and human health.
Intensive animal farming, industrial livestock production, and macro-farms, also known by opponents as factory farming, is a type of intensive agriculture, specifically an approach to animal husbandry designed to maximize production, while minimizing costs. To achieve this, agribusinesses keep livestock such as cattle, poultry, and fish at high stocking densities, at large scale, and using modern machinery, biotechnology, and global trade. The main products of this industry are meat, milk and eggs for human consumption. There are issues regarding whether intensive animal farming is sustainable in the social long-run given its costs in resources. Analysts also raise issues about its ethics.
Poultry farming is the form of animal husbandry which raises domesticated birds such as chickens, ducks, turkeys and geese to produce meat or eggs for food. Poultry – mostly chickens – are farmed in great numbers. More than 60 billion chickens are killed for consumption annually. Chickens raised for eggs are known as layers, while chickens raised for meat are called broilers.
The Dutch Bantam is a breed of bantam chicken originating in the Netherlands. It is a true bantam, a naturally small bird with no related large fowl from which it was miniaturized. It is kept mainly for exhibition, and has been bred in many color varieties; it is a good layer of small eggs.
The Dutch Safety Board is the official body that investigates a wide variety of safety matters in the Netherlands. It is based in The Hague.
The 2008 Chinese milk scandal was a significant food safety incident in China. The scandal involved Sanlu Group's milk and infant formula along with other food materials and components being adulterated with the chemical melamine, which resulted in kidney stones and other kidney damage in infants. The chemical was used to increase the nitrogen content of diluted milk, giving it the appearance of higher protein content in order to pass quality control testing. 300,000 affected children were identified, among which 54,000 were hospitalized, according to the latest report in January 2009. The deaths of six babies were officially concluded to be related to the contaminated milk.
The Irish pork crisis of 2008 was a dioxin contamination incident in Ireland that led to an international recall of pork products from Ireland produced between September and early December of that year. It was disclosed in early December 2008 that contaminated animal feed supplied by one Irish manufacturer to thirty-seven beef farms and nine pig farms across Republic of Ireland, and eight beef farms and one dairy farm in Northern Ireland, had caused the contamination of pork with between 80 and 200 times the EU's recommended limit for dioxins and dioxin-like PCBs i.e. 0.2 ng/g TEQ fat. The Food Safety Authority of Ireland moved on 6 December to recall from the market all Irish pork products dating from 1 September 2008 to that date. The contaminated feed that was supplied to forty-five beef farms across the island was judged to have caused no significant public health risk, accordingly no recall of beef was ordered. Also affected was a dairy farm in Northern Ireland; some milk supplies were withdrawn from circulation. Processors refused to resume slaughter of pigs until they received financial compensation.
Raw meat generally refers to any type of uncooked muscle tissue of an animal used for food. In the meat production industry, the term ‘meat’ refers specifically to mammalian flesh, while the words ‘poultry’ and ‘seafood’ are used to differentiate between the tissue of birds and aquatic creatures.
Food safety incidents in Taiwan have received international media scrutiny.
This article lists major events that happened in 2017 in the Netherlands.
A barn fire, also known as a farm fire or stable fire, occurs when a barn or stable at a farm for the keeping of livestock catches fire, and is partially or wholly destroyed. This can lead to the death of animals, release of toxic fumes, and financial and material damage for insurers, owners, employees and nearby residents.