LANSING, Ill. — As the number of individuals sickened by salmonella enteritidis grows to more than 1,000, salmonella-free Davidson's Safest Choice Pasteurized Shell Eggs (www.safeeggs.com) will be available at Hy-Vee, Inc. stores and Lowe's Foods beginning next week.
Hy-Vee stores throughout the Midwest and Lowe's Foods in North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia will carry the Davidson's Safest Choice brand, produced by National Pasteurized Eggs. Based outside Chicago, NPE pasteurizes eggs via an all-natural, patented process recognized by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to inactivate Salmonella and the Avian Influenza Virus. The company is the world's largest producer of pasteurized shell eggs, and the eggs are used by America's industry leaders in the restaurant, hotel, healthcare and educational fields.
"We're proud to welcome both Hy-Vee and Lowe's to our roster of safety-focused grocers," said Greg West, president of NPE. "Consumers are truly starting to understand the risks of salmonella and since it's impossible to know whether an egg contains salmonella, the prudent choice is to just use pasteurized shell eggs and other pasteurized egg products."
West said that despite recommendations by the FDA to cook eggs thoroughly, many consumers still eat eggs prepared undercooked, such as over easy, sunny side up or softly scrambled. Use of pasteurized eggs also eliminates the issue of cross-contamination of kitchens with salmonella, an issue not addressed by simply cooking eggs.
On August 17, the Food and Drug Administration issued a recommendation to use pasteurized eggs amid news of a massive recall of shell eggs. Additionally, the CDC reported that since May 2010, there has been a fourfold increase in the number of SE isolates identified nationwide through PulseNet http://www.cdc.gov/pulsenet, the national subtyping network made up of state and local public health laboratories and federal food regulatory laboratories. According to the CDC, it received reports of approximately 200 SE cases every week during late June and early July. The CDC received an average of 50 reports of SE illness each week over the past five years.
For more information or to find a retailer, visit www.safeeggs.com.
Source: National Pasteurized Eggs