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Résumé :
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A steam pasteurization process (patent pending) has been shown to effectively reduce pathogenic bacterial populations on beef tissue and to significantly reduce naturally occurring bacterial populations on commercially slaughtered beef carcasses. The objective of this study was to determine the effectiveness of the steam pasteurization treatment for reducing bacterial populations at several anatomical locations on commercially slaughtered carcasses. Before and after pasteurization treatment (82.2 °C, 6.5-s exposure time), a sterile sponge was used to sample 300 cm(2) at one of five locations (inside round, loin, midline, brisket, or neck). Eighty carcasses (40 before treatment and 40 after treatment) were sampled per anatomical location over 2 processing days. Before treatment, aerobic plate counts (APCs) were found to be highest (P less than or equal to 0.01) at the midline (4.5 log(10) CFU/100 cm(2)), intermediate at the inside round, brisket, and neck (ca. 3.8 log(10) CFU/100 cm(2)), and lowest at the loin (3.4 log(10) CFU/100 cm(2)). After treatment, APCs at all locations were reduced significantly (P less than or equal to 0.01). The inside round, loin, and brisket had the lowest (P less than or equal to 0.01) APCs (ca. 2.6 log(10) CFU/100 cm(2)), whereas the midline and neck had APCs of 3.1 and 3.3 log(10) CFU/100 cm(2), respectively.
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