MRSA Bacteria in Your Grocery Store’s Meat Products
Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus bacteria (MRSA), which can cause serious, life-threatening infections of the bloodstream, skin, lungs, and other organs, and is resistant to a number of antibiotics, has been found to be more prevalent in grocery store raw pork products than previously thought.
When the University of Iowa College of Public Health and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy tested 395 samples from 36 stores in Iowa, Minnesota, and New Jersey, they found 7 percent carried MRSA.
“This study shows that the meat we buy in our grocery stores has a higher prevalence of staph than we originally thought,” says lead study author Tara Smith, Ph.D., interim director of the UI Center for Emerging and Infectious Diseases and assistant professor of epidemiology. “With this knowledge, we can start to recommend safer ways to handle raw meat products to make it safer for the consumer.”
The study also noted that pork raised with antibiotics or antibiotic growth promotants were not significantly different in MRSA contamination from antibiotic-free pork products.
“We were surprised to see no significant difference in antibiotic-free and conventionally produced pork,” Smith says. “Though it’s possible that this finding has more to do with the handling of the raw meat at the plant than the way the animals were raised, it’s certainly worth exploring further.”
