Antibacterial activity of decontamination treatments for pig carcasses

Prevention or reduction of carcass contamination with food-borne pathogens during slaughter is of particular importance. Antimicrobial intervention technologies are therefore gaining increasing interest in the slaughter process. In this review, we screened the available recent literature on the decontamination of pig carcasses and appraised the antibacterial activity of treatments. Compared to poultry and beef carcasses, data on decontamination treatments for pig carcasses are so far limited and mainly physical and chemical interventions were investigated. Physical treatments were on the one hand part of the normal pig slaughter process. Dependent on time and temperature conditions, the bactericidal effect of scalding was shown in several studies, whereas the effect of singeing or chilling differed widely. On the other hand, interventions as hot water spraying, steam treatment or ultraviolet light were additionally applied with the specific objective of carcass decontamination. Hot water spraying and steam treatment thereby yielded bacterial reductions ranging from 1.0 to 2.1 orders of magnitude. Chemical interventions primary included lactic and acetic acid. Under commercial conditions, lactic acid treatment yielded bacterial reductions ranging from 0.2 to 1.0 orders of magnitude.