Bacteriological evaluation of fresh chicken sausage submitted to gamma radiation

Many developed countries have established a goal of self-sufficiency in food production, while many other obtain their principal foreign exchange through food exports. For these reasons, it is essential to eliminate losses in food products. It is no less important to prevent or combat food-transmitted diseases, principally across poultry and poultry derivatives, which play a major role in certain infections and is the focus of national public health goals in order to increase the international commerce. In tropical countries, perishable products represent the largest markets. The population lives in a constant battle against the deterioration of these foods. Such loss is enormous where the climate favors the proliferation of agents of decomposition and acceleration of putrification. Increasing the useful life of these perishable products will provide producers the option of commercializing them in low harvest season, thus achieving higher prices, and providing sensible growth to the agro-industrial market. Treatment of perishables with gamma radiation presently constitutes one of the most modern, safe, and efficient methods for increasing food preservation. The irradiation of foods can offer various special advantages such as: kill or sterilize pathogenic organisms in food, improving their quality and duration, reducing the level of toxics, slow or stop the aging of roots and tubers, disinfect products of animal and vegetable origin thus slowing their decomposition, increasing their shelf-life, and prolonging their conservation refrigeration. The practice of irradiating foods for the treatment of microorganisms has begun to gain momentum in Brazil, where roughly 25% of all food produced annually is lost to disease and insects activity, increased by lack of adequate storage treatments. Various countries have already adopted the method that, when practiced properly by qualified professionals, does not cause side effects other than the extension of useful life. In light of the lack of present data on the irradiation of fresh chicken sausage, the objective of this study is to evaluate determine the efficiency of this method as a process for reducing the microbial load via measurement of the bacteriology of the product before and after gamma radiation. 45 sample of chicken sausage(acquired directly from the poultry industry) were prepared divided in 3 treatments: the first is a control, the second and third using application of 1,5 and 3,0 kGy, respectively. The chicken sausages irradiated with a dose of 1,5 kGy did not have, statistically significant results apparent in the bacteriological measures. Samples irradiated with 3,0 kGy did experience statistically significant reductions. It is concluded that the irradiating the product with a dose of 3,0 kGy is more effective for the reduction of bacterial population, with the data in these trials indicating a 95,3% reduction in total coliforms, 100% removal of fecal coliforms, and 84,0% reduction of mesophiles, relative to the control samples. (author)