[Federal Register Volume 63, Number 218 (Thursday, November 12, 1998)]
[Notices]
[Pages 63283-63284]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 98-30182]


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 Notices
                                                 Federal Register
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 This section of the FEDERAL REGISTER contains documents other than rules 
 or proposed rules that are applicable to the public. Notices of hearings 
 and investigations, committee meetings, agency decisions and rulings, 
 delegations of authority, filing of petitions and applications and agency 
 statements of organization and functions are examples of documents 
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  Federal Register / Vol. 63, No. 218 / Thursday, November 12, 1998 / 
Notices  

[[Page 63283]]


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DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

Food Safety and Inspection Service
[Docket No. 97-057N]


Notice of Change of Inspection Procedures; Adoption of Selective 
Carcass Palpation Procedure for Lambs

AGENCY: Food Safety and Inspection Service, USDA.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) of the 
Department of Agriculture (USDA) is clarifying the changes that it 
intends to make in its inspection procedures for lambs. Currently, 
inspectors extensively palpate the carcasses of lambs for the purpose 
of detecting and removing carcasses with caseous lymphadenitis. The 
Agency announced in a October 27, 1997, Federal Register notice that it 
would be changing its inspection procedure for lambs in response to a 
petition from the American Sheep Association. In this notice, the 
Agency is clarifying the changes that it intends to make and the basis 
for those changes.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Dr. Alice Thaler, Chief, Concepts and 
Design Branch, Inspection Systems Development Division, Office of 
Policy, Program Development, and Evaluation, FSIS; telephone (202) 205-
0005 or FAX (202) 690-0824.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: FSIS is issuing this notice to clarify, and 
to provide additional information about the basis for, certain planned 
changes in how it inspects lamb carcasses that it announced in the 
Federal Register of October 27, 1997 (62 FR 55569). The National 
Advisory Committee on Meat and Poultry Inspection recommended that FSIS 
clarify the terminology that it used in the October 27 notice, and that 
the Agency more fully explain the basis for its planned action. In the 
October 27 notice, FSIS used the term ``hands-on'' to describe its 
current inspection procedures and the term ``hands-off'' to describe 
the new inspection procedures that it planned to implement. FSIS 
believes that the terms ``extensive carcass palpation'' and ``selective 
carcass palpation'' more accurately describe its current and its 
planned new inspection procedures for lambs. Thus, it is replacing the 
terms used in the October 27 notice to describe its inspection 
procedures with these terms and will use these terms.
    Traditionally, USDA meat inspectors have extensively palpated the 
carcasses of lambs as part of their post-mortem evaluation of these 
animals. The American Sheep Industry Association petitioned the Agency 
to end this practice for food safety reasons. The primary justification 
for this long-standing extensive carcass palpation practice was to 
detect carcasses with caseous lymphadenitis.
    In determining the desirability of such a procedure for lambs, FSIS 
considered two questions: (1) Will diseased carcasses or parts be more 
likely to reach consumers using a selective carcass palpation 
inspection procedure, and (2) Are current inspection procedures which 
use extensive carcass palpation likely to be spreading or adding 
contamination to carcasses?

Description of Extensive and Selective Carcass Palpation

    Extensive carcass palpation for lambs is described in the Meat and 
Poultry Inspection Manual's inspection procedures for sheep (which 
includes lambs) and goats (MPI Manual 11.1(j)(2)) as follows:
     Palpate prefemoral, superficial inguinal, or supramammary, 
and popliteal lymph nodes.
     Palpate back and sides of carcass.
     Palpate prescapular lymph nodes and shoulders, and lift 
forelegs.
    These procedures are considered extensive carcass palpation because 
no other livestock species receives palpation of this magnitude.
    In contrast, selective carcass palpation will mean that inspectors 
palpate lamb carcasses only when they have reason to believe that 
disease conditions or pathology may be present. Selective carcass 
palpation will apply only to carcasses and not to viscera. Selective 
carcass palpation will not change other inspection procedures for lambs 
such as turning the carcass, which is necessary to perform inspection 
procedures.

Comparing Extensive Carcass Palpation to Selective Carcass 
Palpation Procedures

    In determining whether to change inspection procedures for lamb 
carcasses, FSIS first considered the benefits derived from extensive 
carcass palpation and determined what food safety or other consumer 
protection benefits, if any, are attributable to the current inspection 
procedure. Caseous lymphadenitis is the primary disease of lambs 
detected by extensive carcass palpation. In the United States, six 
federally inspected plants slaughter 80 percent of the lambs. From 
Fiscal Years 1987 to 1996, these six plants slaughtered 26,347,480 
lambs and yearlings (present data do not distinguish between lambs and 
yearlings), and FSIS inspectors condemned only 1,203 animals for 
caseous lymphadenitis, a 0.0046 percent condemnation rate.
    Caseous lymphadenitis is rare in lambs, and it does not cause 
foodborne illness in people who eat lamb, regardless of how thoroughly 
or not it is cooked, or in people who handle lamb. Of the diseases 
routinely present in lambs, seven are of public health concern: 
actinobacillosis, campylobacteriosis, contagious ecthyma, 
echinococcosis, leptospirosis, Salmonella dysentery, and toxoplasmosis. 
None of these seven, however, requires carcass palpation for diagnosis.
    FSIS then considered whether the current inspection techniques used 
on lambs that employ extensive carcass palpation cause inspectors to 
spread or add contamination to lamb carcasses. Although there is no 
published data on this question, the unpublished data provided to FSIS 
by the American Sheep Industry Association (LeValley 1997) \1\ and data 
from other food handling and health care industries (Gould and Ream 
1996; Wenzel and Pulverer 1995), support the concern that extensive 
carcass palpation can contaminate lamb carcasses or spread 
contamination.
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    \1\ This information is on display in the FSIS Docket Room, 300 
12th St., SW., Washington, DC.

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[[Page 63284]]

Conclusion

    The primary reason for extensive carcass palpation in lambs is to 
detect lesions of caseous lymphadenitis. This disease does not cause 
foodborne illness and has an extremely low prevalence in lambs. Other 
diseases routinely present in lamb carcasses that are of public health 
concern are not detected by carcass palpation. Therefore, there is 
little basis to find that selective carcass palpation will cause 
foodborne illness or cause diseased carcasses or parts to reach 
consumers.
    On the other hand, the cited literature attests to the fact that 
hands are capable of spreading or adding microorganisms. Although it 
has not been proven directly that extensive carcass palpation by lamb 
inspectors causes microbial contamination or actually spreads such 
contamination, the evidence from the sheep industry and allied 
industries strongly suggests that this can occur. Thus, current 
inspection procedures using extensive carcass palpation can spread or 
add contamination to carcasses.
    FSIS, therefore, announced in the October 27, 1997, Federal 
Register notice that it was taking a hands-off inspection approach to 
lambs. As stated previously, this approach is more accurately described 
as selective carcass palpation. Adopting this approach entails a number 
of steps, including consultation with employee organizations. 
Additional information may be found in a new FSIS directive on the 
Agency's planned inspection procedures for lambs, which will be 
effective upon publication and after consultations have been completed.
    FSIS will continue to monitor condemnation rates in plants that 
slaughter lambs to identify the impact, if any, of the change. Further, 
the Agency intends to look at the implications of handling product 
during inspection procedures with regard to the production of all meat 
and poultry products.

    Done at Washington, DC, on: November 4, 1998.
Thomas J. Billy,
Administrator.

References

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[FR Doc. 98-30182 Filed 11-10-98; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3410-DM-P