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Salmonella Scare Prompts Houston Schools to Replace Sandwiches

HOUSTON — Houston school district officials, prompted by a nationwide recall of peanut butter believed to be tainted with salmonella, on Thursday confiscated children's sandwiches from home and replaced them with those made at schools. Abelardo Saavedra, superintendent of the state's largest district at about 203,000 students, was quoted as saying, "We didn't want to take any chances that our parents didn't know about this recall, and that's why we asked the schools to immediately replace peanut butter sandwiches brought from home. Our first priority every day is to keep kids safe."

ConAgra Foods Inc. told consumers to discard certain jars of Peter Pan and Great Value peanut butter after the spread was linked to a salmonella outbreak that has sickened almost 300 people nationwide. Lids of jars with a product code beginning ''2111'' can be returned to ConAgra for a refund, the company said.

The salmonella outbreak, which federal health officials said Wednesday has sickened 288 people in 39 states since August, was linked to tainted peanut butter produced by ConAgra at a plant in Sylvester, Ga. Dr. Mike Lynch, an epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was cited as saying how salmonella got into peanut butter is still under investigation. CDC officials believe the salmonella outbreak to be the nation's first stemming from peanut butter. The most cases were reported in New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Tennessee and Missouri. About 20 percent of all the ill were hospitalized, and there were no deaths, Lynch said. About 85 percent of the infected people said they ate peanut butter, CDC officials said.

ConAgra spokesman Chris Kircher was cited as saying the firm was unsure why the CDC identified peanut butter as the source of the problem and that its own tests of its peanut butter and the plant have been negative, but it shut down the plant so it can investigate, adding, "We're trying to understand what else we need to do or should be doing."

Kircher was further cited as calling the recall a precaution, stating, "We want to do what's right by the consumer." ConAgra officials haven't said how much peanut butter is covered in the recall. Kircher added that ConAgra randomly tests 60 to 80 jars of peanut butter that come off the line each day for salmonella and other pathogens, adding, "We've had no positive hits on that going back for years." The plant itself is also regularly tested, he said, though he didn't know how often. He said none of those tests have detected salmonella either.

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