Letter: Egg farm knew of salmonella

September 15, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

The Iowa egg farm at the center of a massive salmonella outbreak received hundreds of positive results for salmonella in the two years before its eggs sickened more than 1,500 people, congressional investigators said Tuesday.

In a letter to the company’s owner, the House Energy and Commerce Committee said its investigators had obtained records showing Wright County Egg received 426 positive results for salmonella between 2008 and 2010. The company recalled 380 million eggs in August after its products were linked to hundreds of illnesses.

The committee said the positive results found over the last two years included 73 samples that were potentially positive for Salmonella Enteritidis, the strain responsible for the recent outbreak.

In the letter to Austin “Jack” DeCoster, the owner of Wright County Egg, committee chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and investigations subcommittee chairman Bart Stupak, D-Mich., said they were concerned that DeCoster did not inform them of the positive results when the panel asked him to provide documents in August. One of the questions the panel asked DeCoster was to show dates and results of all positive findings after microbiological testing.

DeCoster is scheduled to testify before the panel next week.