Faulty Valve Linked to Cases of Salmonella

A malfunctioning pipe valve at a dairy was the most likely cause of a salmonella outbreak that sickened 18,000 people in six Midwestern states last spring, according to a report issued Saturday by a team of experts.

The valve apparently allowed contaminated raw milk to mix with pasteurized milk and had malfunctioned for almost a year at the Hillfarm Dairy in suburban Melrose Park, owned by the Jewel Companies Inc. grocery chain, state Inspector General Jeremy Margolis said at a news conference.

“This wasn’t sabotage, this wasn’t a superbug, this wasn’t a failure of the pasteurization process,” he said. “It was a unique microbiological engineering phenomenon.”

“The salmonella was in the plant at least from August of 1984 and possibly as of June, 1984,” said Jerome J. Kozak, an official of the Food and Drug Administration’s milk safety branch. The outbreak began last March.

No Negligence Seen

Apparently, the valve intermittently allowed salmonella to enter pasteurized milk products during a mixing operation that was the final step in production, Margolis said.

The report did not accuse Jewel of any wrongdoing or negligence.

Jewel spokesman John Haugabrook refused to comment on the findings until he has seen the report.

“We are talking about a pretty unusual sequence of events that had to occur to permit this contamination,” said Dr. Paul Blake of the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta.

Nearly 18,000 persons in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin reported suffering diarrhea, vomiting, stomach pains and other symptoms of the acute infectious disease. Salmonella was blamed for two deaths and contributed to four others.