Prevalence of Staphylococcus aureus in meat and meat products

Subject Areas : Aquatic Products

Fatemeh  Nonahal ¹ (M.Sc Student Food Engineering, Faculty of Agriculture, Ghochan Branch, Islamic Azad University, Ghochan, Iran)
Ebrahim  Rahimi ² (Department of Food Technology, Faculty of Agriculture, Shahrekord Branch, Islamic Azad University, Shahrekord, Iran)
Esmail  Ataie Salehi ³ (Department of Food Technology, Faculty of Agriculture, Ghochan Branch, Islamic Azad University, Ghochan, Iran)

Received: 2014-11-22 Accepted : 2014-11-22 Published : 2014-11-01

Keywords: Staphylococcus aureus, meat, Meat products,

Abstract :

Staphylococcus aureus as the second or third important food-borne pathogen all around the world. Ability of development and production of heat-stable enterotoxin in a wide range of the food made  Staphylococcus has one of the most important factors causing the food poisoning. This study was done to investigates the prevalence of Staphylococcus in meat and  meat products  in  Esfahan. From summer to winter 2012, 450 samples including  raw beef (n=80), minced meat (n=80), lamb (n=80), goat (n=80), camel (n=50), hamburger (n=40), kebab (n=40) were randomly collected from butcheries and supermarkets  in Isfahan, and analyzed for the presence of S. aureus. Totally, 234 (55/6 %) S. aureus were detected in meat and meat products. The mean count of S. aureus in positive samples was 8/3×102. The results indicated that although the percentage of contaminated  samples was high, The number of bacteria presented in the samples is low with no potential risk for public health. To effectively manage the food production for decreasing diseases more epidemiologic investigations about S. aureus toxication are needed.