Exactly where the eggs went, how much and whether any of it ended up in trade will have to be determined by listing intermediaries and end users, a spokesman for the agriculture ministry in hanover said on saturday. But there is no immediate danger to health from eating eggs contaminated with pcbs (polychlorinated biphenyls). Extensive investigations are underway to determine the cause, with initial results expected next week. Producer was an organic free-range farm with 18,000 laying hens in oldenburg county.
A discounter based in bavaria had discovered the contamination of the eggs during a check of its goods. PCB levels exceeded the EU’s permitted level by 100 percent. However, a spokeswoman for the bavarian state office for health and food safety said that this product had not been delivered to bavaria itself. The control was already carried out on 7. The results of the extensive analyses, however, were not available until april 30. April ahead.
According to the ministry of agriculture in hanover, the contamination is non-dioxin-like pcbs. They are considered less dangerous than the twelve pcbs, which have a particularly similar structure and effect to many dioxins.
Immediately after the study results were presented, it was ordered that all eggs from the farm in oldenburg land could not be sold for the time being. All eggs present at a packing station in saxony-anhalt and over 100,000 shipped to holland have been frozen. Since it cannot be ruled out that consumers still have contaminated eggs in their refrigerators at home, the ministry also published the producer code. Eggs with the code 0 – DE-0357911 are affected. In the meantime, egg samples were taken from various departments of the organic farm. The feed as well as the soil are also examined.
Only recently, the discovery of contaminants in eggs in north rhine-westphalia and lower saxony caused unrest. In the case of the three affected farms in the district of aurich, the authorities in lower saxony concentrated their search for the cause on the ground. After random samples had revealed elevated values, the run-out areas of the chickens were systematically examined. Final results are still to come.