The ministry of health has ruled out the presence of the deadly listeriosis outbreak strain, ST6, from the Rainbow Chicken Limited polony production factory in Wolwehoek, Free State.
However, it has emphasised that the presence of other L.monocytogenes sequence types identified in some of their products, is still cause for caution.
“The ministry of health confirms that the result of laboratory tests done on environmental samples collected from RCL Foods Wolwehoek production facility showed Listeria monocytogenes. However, whole genome sequencing has confirmed that the strains found in the production facility are not the ST6 outbreak strain which has caused 91% of the human cases during the outbreak. This corroborates the results reported by RCL Foods at a French laboratory,” the ministerial spokesperson, Popo Maja, said this morning.
The factory was closed by the company as a “precautionary measure” and their polony products were recalled.
The outbreak – which has been the largest recorded in the world – has claimed the lives of 183 people, with 978 laboratory confirmed cases.
Maja stated: “While there is no evidence of the outbreak strain in the sampled RCL Foods retail polony products or the production facility, the presence of L. monocytogenes of other sequence types in retail polony chubs as well as the production facility do also cause the disease and require corrective actions and monitoring.”