The Food Standards Agency (FSA) has published the last set of results from its third survey of campylobacter contamination in fresh shop-bought UK-produced chickens.
The full year’s results cover the period from August 2016 to July 2017 and are based on a total of 3,980 whole fresh chickens sampled at retail. They show that on average, across the entire market, 6.5% of chickens tested positive for the highest level of contamination. This is down from 19.7% in 2014/15 when the survey began.
Key findings are:
- The figure for high-level campylobacter prevalence (more than 1,000 cfu/g) among the top nine retailers (based on market share) was 5.6%
- The ‘Others’ group, consisting of smaller retailers and butchers, had a significantly higher prevalence at 17.1% compared to the top nine retailers
- There was a significant fall in the percentage of chickens positive for campylobacter at any level down from 73.2% in 2014/15 to 54% in 2016/17
- In last period of the third annual survey, April-July 2017, based on a total of 1,437 chicken samples 5.9% of chickens had high levels of campylobacter (over 1,000 cfu/g) down from 20.1% for the same period in 2014
WANT TO KNOW MORE ABOUT CAMPYLOBACTER
Read IFST's Information Statement on Foodborne Campylobacteriosis