• On September 19, 2017, USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) issued a notice requiring inspection personnel to notify establishments in hurricane-affected areas to reassess their hazard plans to ensure products are unadulterated.
  • Under FSIS requirements, every establishment must reassess the adequacy of its HACCP plan whenever any changes occur that could affect the hazard analysis or alter the plan. A hurricane is considered such a change.
  • FSIS inspection personnel will be:
    • Verifying whether sanitation procedures and any cleaning and related monitoring are adequate to address any additional sanitation problems related to the hurricanes; and
    • Reviewing the establishment’s testing data to identify any adverse trends that may indicate problems with microbial contamination.
  • In establishments producing ready-to-eat products that were affected by service failures including flooding, prolonged electric service failure and boil water orders, FSIS may schedule risk-based Listeria monocytogenes sampling to verify restoration of sanitary conditions upon re-starting operations.  For additional information click here.