and Drug Administration will no longer detain cucumbers from the Mexican growers whose products were linked to an outbreak of Salmonella earlier this year.The agency removed the two cucumber suppliers from its import alerts list this week, meaning that their products can no longer be “detained without physical examination.”
The cucumbers were placed on the list April 23, 2013 after they were named as the likely source of an ongoing outbreak of Salmonella Saintpaul that would eventually sicken 84 people in 18 states. The implicated cucumbers were imported by Tricar Sales of Rio Rico, AZ , and supplied to that company by Daniel Cardenas Izabal and Miracle Greenhouse, both of Culiacán, Mexico.
“Reviewing shipping records, with assistance from its partner state agencies, FDA traced cucumbers eaten by seven people who were made sick during the outbreak to the importer and further, to the suppliers, Daniel Cardenas Izabal and Miracle Greenhouse,” said FDA in its outbreak report.
While evidence pointed to the Mexican cucumbers as the outbreak source, tests on samples of the cucumbers and facilities where they were grown and processed came up negative for Salmonella. However by the time public health officials identified the cucumbers as the likely outbreak source, the potentially contaminated cukes would no longer be on the market.
The outbreak lasted from mid-January through the end of April, with the last case beginning April 28.
Tricar Sales was founded as a U.S. distributor for crops generated by Daniel Cardenas Izabal in 1952.
