1
|
Mokhtari A, Pang H, Santillana Farakos S, McKenna C, Crowley C, Cranford V, Bowen A, Phillips S, Madad A, Obenhuber D, Van Doren JM. Leveraging risk assessment for foodborne outbreak investigations: The Quantitative Risk Assessment-Epidemic Curve Prediction Model. RISK ANALYSIS : AN OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF THE SOCIETY FOR RISK ANALYSIS 2023; 43:324-338. [PMID: 35171502 DOI: 10.1111/risa.13896] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/14/2023]
Abstract
Root cause analysis can be used in foodborne illness outbreak investigations to determine the underlying causes of an outbreak and to help identify actions that could be taken to prevent future outbreaks. We developed a new tool, the Quantitative Risk Assessment-Epidemic Curve Prediction Model (QRA-EC), to assist with these goals and applied it to a case study to investigate and illustrate the utility of leveraging quantitative risk assessment to provide unique insights for foodborne illness outbreak root cause analysis. We used a 2019 Salmonella outbreak linked to melons as a case study to demonstrate the utility of this model (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2019). The model was used to evaluate the impact of various root cause hypotheses (representing different contamination sources and food safety system failures in the melon supply chain) on the predicted number and timeline of illnesses. The predicted number of illnesses varied by contamination source and was strongly impacted by the prevalence and level of Salmonella contamination on the surface/inside of whole melons and inside contamination niches on equipment surfaces. The timeline of illnesses was most strongly impacted by equipment sanitation efficacy for contamination niches. Evaluations of a wide range of scenarios representing various potential root causes enabled us to identify which hypotheses, were likely to result in an outbreak of similar size and illness timeline to the 2019 Salmonella melon outbreak. The QRA-EC framework can be adapted to accommodate any food-pathogen pairs to provide insights for foodborne outbreak investigations.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Amir Mokhtari
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Hao Pang
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Sofia Santillana Farakos
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Crystal McKenna
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Cecilia Crowley
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Vanessa Cranford
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - April Bowen
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Sheena Phillips
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Asma Madad
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Donald Obenhuber
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| | - Jane M Van Doren
- Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, 5001 Campus Drive, College Park, Maryland, 20740, USA
| |
Collapse
|