A family of six fell ill with a rare parasitic disease caused by roundworm larvae after eating bear meat kebabs.
According to NBC News: Report released this week Centers for Disease Control and Prevention It revealed new details about an outbreak that began in July 2022 at a hospital where nine employees work. Family reunion in South Dakota.
A family member brought meat from a black bear they had hunted in northern Canada and had kept in a home freezer for 45 days. Hunting black bears is legal in Canada and many U.S. states.
The family made kebabs with thawed meat and grilled vegetables, and according to the CDC, the dark color of the meat made it hard to tell if the kebabs were fully cooked, so they were unintentionally served and eaten rare.
A week later, a family member, a 29-year-old man from Minnesota, developed symptoms including fever, severe muscle pain and swelling around his eyes, and was hospitalized twice for his symptoms.
The man tested positive for antibodies to Trichinella spiralis, a type of roundworm, and five other family members also developed symptoms including fever, headache, abdominal pain, diarrhea, muscle pain and swelling around the eyes.
The other two infected people did not develop symptoms, but the CDC could not confirm whether the ninth person was infected with Trichinella..
of The CDC tested the remaining frozen foods. Larvae of the same roundworm species were found in the meat.
The agency presumed that all six members of the family had trichinosis, which is caused by eating undercooked meat contaminated with Trichinella spiralis larvae.
Such infections are rare. Between January 2016 and December 2022, the CDC identified seven trichinellosis outbreaks in the United States, with 35 suspected or confirmed cases, most of which were linked to bear meat.
Trichinosis is different from the parasitic infection that afflicted presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Recently Revealed Kennedy once suffered from The brain infection he suffered from was caused by the pig tapeworm. Larva.
According to the CDC, two of the infected people at the family gathering ate only vegetables and no meat. Trichinella-infected meat can cause cross-contamination, so meat and meat juices should be kept separate from other foods during cooking.
Three members of the family were hospitalized – each had eaten bear meat – and were treated with albendazole, which kills the parasite and its larvae.
All six recovered from the illness.
The CDC report cautions that freezing meat doesn’t kill all species of Trichinella — for example, bear meat served at a family gathering was contaminated with a species that lives in Arctic bears and can tolerate freezing.
“People who eat wild game meat should be aware that proper cooking is the only sure way to kill the Trichinella parasite,” the report authors wrote.
The CDC recommends cooking wild game meat to an internal temperature of at least 165 degrees Fahrenheit, which should be checked with a meat thermometer rather than just looking at the color of the meat.
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