OCCURRENCE OF SALMONELLA ON MEAT AND PRODUCTS IN AN OSTRICH ABATTOIR AS DETERMINED WITH A DNA-PROBE

This study was conducted to determine the status of Salmonella during the processing of ostriches to ostrich meat and products. When a total of 1429 samples, collected from fillet, liver, gizzards, bloodmeal, s kins, heart, faeces, large and small intestines, carcases, wash-water from feathers and from carcases, water before wash and other sources d uring the ostrich processing, were screened for Salmonella spp, using a Salmonella specific DNA probe, the results showed that 16.9% of the samples were positive for presence of Salmonella. Further analysis sho wed that (61/120) 50.8% of all the ostriches tested were positive for Salmonella upon arrival at the slaughter house. These results further showed that 33.3% of the carcases tested were, positive for Salmonella . This indicated that the ostriches may have been contaminated at the rearing farm environment, during transportation or even at the abattoi r environment itself. The products which were Salmonella positive were : gizzards (5%); the skins (8.3%); bloodmeal (4.2%); large intestines (26.2%); small intestines (16.1%) and faeces (44.2%). Products which w ere negative for Salmonella presence included: heart tissue, liver, fi llet steak and meat-and-bone-meal. When the positive samples were furt her analysed to determine the level of bacterial concentrations in eac h positive sample, the results showed that the main ostrich products f or export, such as ostrich meat, meat and bone-meal and ostrich fillet were negative for Salmonella. The only export products that showed Sa lmonella presence, were the skins with only an 8.3% positivity rate. T he bacterial concentrations in the positive skin samples were so:low t hat Salmonella contamination in this product is probably eliminated th rough further processing, such as tanning before export of this produc t.