Small Produce Farm Environments Can Harbor Diverse Listeria monocytogenes and Listeria spp. Populations

What is it about?

Listeria is prevalent in the New York State pre-harvest produce environment, and as a result, it is possible for Listeria from the pre-harvest environment to contaminate produce, and/or be introduced to the processing environment (from the farm). However, the considerable Listeria diversity observed in the small area within this produce farm, and the evidence of exchange or continuous re-introduction of Listeria, indicate it is likely not feasible to successfully trace isolates from finished product or the processing environment back to farm sources, unless a large number of samples are collected and a large number of isolates are subtyped.

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