Lidl reports that Campylobacter levels in chicken meat exceeded FSA targets in the second quarter of 2022.
The supermarket chain recorded 8% of poultry in the top category, up from 2% last year and 6% in the previous quarter.
The highest Food Standards Agency (FSA) level is 7% Campylobacter for birds above 1,000 colony forming units per gram (CFU/g).
Data from all nine retailers covering the high detection rate of Campylobacter in fresh, store-bought UK-produced chickens between April 2022 and June 2022.
Results for Lidl and Asda rose, while pollution levels at Sainsbury’s, Marks and Spencer, Morrisons, Waitrose and Aldi fell compared to the previous quarter. The figures for Tesco and Co-op remain unchanged.
Asda informed that 2.4% of people detected the highest pollution levels in the latest quarter, compared to 1% in the previous three months.
Campylobacter is the most common cause of bacterial food poisoning in the UK, with doses as low as a few hundred cells needed to make people sick.
Lower or stable results
Sainsbury’s Q2 2022 Campylobacter results show that 3 % chicken levels were around 1,000 cfu/g compared to the past quarter.
For Marks and Spencer, 1% was in the largest category in April, 4% in May, and 3% in June, from 376 sampled chickens.
In January 2022, 4% of chickens exceeded 1,000 CFU/g, and 3% and 10% of poultry were the same in February and March, respectively.
For Tesco, 3% of the 298 sample is over 1,000 CFU/gf in the second quarter of 2022, the same as the first three months.
Aldi revealed that 3.3% of chickens sampled were in the category above 1,000 CFU/g, compared to 4.2% in the previous quarter.
1.6% of Morrisons’ 101 chickens were at the highest level of contamination, compared to nearly 6% of the same number of samples in the first quarter of 2022.
No chickens from Waitrose and Partners tested positive for Campylobacter at levels above 1,000 CFU/g, compared to 1% in the previous quarter.
Collaborative results for the third quarter show that no chickens were exposed to higher levels of contamination than 1,000 CFU/g.
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