WREX.com – Rockford’s News LeaderAP Exclusive: Bad peanuts found before outbreak

AP Exclusive: Bad peanuts found before outbreak

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The federal government is acknowledging that a shipment of peanuts by the plant linked to a salmonella outbreak contained a "filthy, putrid or decomposed substance" later determined to be metal fragments.

That shipment was returned to the U.S. from Canada in April, months earlier than reflected in a federal tracking database.

According to government records, the rejected shipment was logged by the Food and Drug Administration but never tested by federal inspectors.

The incident took place in mid-September, the records show, weeks before the earliest signs of the salmonella outbreak that has sickened more than 500 people in the United States and may have killed at least eight.

Recalls: dry-roasted peanuts, ice cream, pie

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Illinois is feeling the impact of the peanut-related recalls that have been hitting the country because of concern about possible salmonella contamination.

Meijer is recalling two types of its Meijer Brand dry-roasted peanuts and four types of Meijer Brand ice cream novelties, sold in its stores in Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky.

Downers Grove (Illinois)-based Sara Lee is recalling Chef Pierre Chocolate Peanut Butter Silk Pie. That's a foodservice product.

And Perry's Ice Cream is expanding its recall of select ice cream products containing peanut butter. Those products were distributed in Illinois, Indiana and more than a dozen other states.

Salmonella can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections, especially in young children, the elderly and those with weakened immune systems.

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