University of Liverpool launches £2M norovirus project
The move follows the publication of a draft report from the Advisory Committee on the Microbiological Safety of Food (ACMSF) last month calling for more surveillance and investigation of foodborne viruses.
It also chimes with the FSA’s stated intention to make research into the virus one of its science and evidence priorities for 2014.
Norovirus outbreaks can rapidly affect large numbers of people. In 2012 a batch of frozen strawberries infected 11,000 people in Germany.
But Liverpool University said there were significant gaps in the authorities’ understanding of which strains caused infection and which foods were most likely to harbour the virus.
Swabs from work surfaces
Researchers will collect swabs from work surfaces at more than 200 pubs, restaurants and hotels in the north west and south east of England. That is designed to help the FSA to develop plans to reduce the transmission of norovirus.
The proportion of infections coming from the food itself and the proportion of those coming from the people and environment involved in bringing it to the plate is unclear. The team will also investigate occurrences of the virus in shops in three of the highest risk foodstuffs: oysters, salads and berries.
It aims to combine the information with the outputs of the other research strands to generate an assessment of the true impact of the virus to infection in the UK.
The FSA funded study will be conducted through a collaboration comprising Liverpool University’s Institute for Infection and Global Health, Public Health England, the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science, the Food and Environment Research Agency, Leatherhead Food Research and the University of East Anglia.
‘Lack of data’
Professor Sarah O’Brien, epidemiology and population health expert, at Liverpool University said: “The FSA has been hampered by a lack of data on the origins of outbreaks in the past, but this research should give it enough information to work on prevention strategies, and insight which allows it to focus its resources most effectively.”
O'Brien, who is also chair of the ACMSF, will be describing the use of horizon scanning to identify emerging food safety hazards at Food Manufacture’s one-day food safety conference ‘Safe and legal food in a changing world’, which takes place on Wednesday, 15 October 2014 at the Heritage Motor Centre in Gaydon, Warwickshire. For more details visit the conference web site.
