The Canadian Food Inspection Agency first became aware of problems with beef produced at an Alberta company when tests conducted in the U.S. came back positive for E. coli.
Agency spokesman Garfield Balsom confirmed that word of the positive findings came from the Food Safety Inspection Service of the U.S. Drug Authority on Sept. 3, nearly two weeks before the CFIA began issuing advisories about ground beef products produced at Edmonton-based XL Foods.
Balsom said XL initiated the recall on its own, insisting it was not ordered as a result of the U.S. test results. "There were some positives identified by the FSIS, but the positives were not the trigger for the recall," Balsom said. "The recall was a voluntary recall by the company."
A statement on the FSIS website said both the service and the CFIA conducted followup tests on the beef products. The FSIS has issued a public health warning about the contaminated meat and said it's working to ensure all affected products are pulled from store shelves.
The international twist is the latest development in a recall that has already spread from coast to coast and depleted meat supplies at nearly all the country's major groceries.
The CFIA issued yet another expansion to a recall of ground beef products, extending an advisory whose scope has grown almost daily since it was first issued Sept. 16.
The latest additions to the growing list involve not only packages of ground beef, but products prepared with the meat suspected of containing E. coli. Those include sausages, meat loaf, meatballs and burgers.
Unbranded meat products carried at Walmart locations in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and B.C. have been recalled. The other products included in the expanded advisory were sold at Metro locations in Ontario and Safeway stores in all five provinces.
