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Streptococcus equi subsp. zooepidemicus (SEZ) is a highly contagious infectious organism that causes disease in horses. SEZ is seldom isolated from humans; however, zoonotic infections are occasionally reported in individuals exposed to horses and other livestock. Herein, we report three human cases of SEZ in individuals, one with direct horse contact and two among individuals who had eaten raw horse meat. The phylogenetic tree showed that the genotypes of SEZ isolates from two of the cases on Jeju Island, South Korea, were similar to those of isolates from the United Kingdom and the United States of America.

In order to extend scientific knowledge on autochthonous Italian equine meat, the physical-chemical parameters of Catria Horse Longissimus thoracis (LT) muscle and its nutritional characteristics have been investigated. Ten steaks of Catria foal raised at pasture and fattened indoors for 2 months were dissected, and LT muscle was analyzed for chemical composition, total iron, drip loss, colorimetric characteristics, intramuscular fat, fatty acid profile and nutritional indexes. Steak dissection showed that LT muscle accounted for 36.78% and fat accounted for 9.19% of weight of steak. Regarding chemical composition, protein and fat content was 20.31% and 2.83%, respectively. Total iron content (1.95 mg/100 g) was lower than data reported in the literature. Color parameters showed a luminous and intense red hue muscle. The sum of unsaturated fatty acid composition (50.3%) was higher than the sum of saturated fatty acids (46.64 %). The fatty acid profile and nutritional values of Catria Horse meat could be modified adopting extensive rearing systems and grazing. The data suggests that further investigation on the composition of Catria Horse meat should be carried out to valorize this autochthonous breed, reared in sustainable livestock systems, and its meat in local short-chain systems.

Safe food is the right of every citizen of the European Union (EU). A comprehensive and dynamic framework of food and feed safety legislation has been put in place and the EU's executive arm - the European Commission - is responsible for ensuring that the EU member states apply food law consistently. Similarly, the Commission plays an important role in ensuring that imported food meets the EU's stringent food safety standards. Consumer perceptions of unsafe food tend to focus on acute outbreaks of bacterial or viral origin. In recent years there have been a number of diverse food crises associated with fraudulent activity which may (e.g. melamine in dairy products in China) or may not (e.g. the horse meat scandal in the EU) represent a genuine food safety risk. Well publicized incidents of chronic exposure to chemical contamination in the EU (e.g. dioxins in meat and mycotoxins in nuts) have required robust coordinated policy responses from the Commission. Despite the decreasing incidence of non-compliant residues of veterinary medicinal products and banned substances in animal products, EU consumers are increasingly concerned about the use of such products in food-producing animals, including in the context of the build-up of antimicrobial resistance in animals and transfer to humans. The Commission plays a key role in coordination of the EU member states' responses to such incidents, in risk management, and in preparation for emerging issues. This paper focuses on how the EU as a whole has dealt with a number of food crises, and what can be learned from past incidents. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The present work aims to investigate if the variation of each parameter in Longissimus lumborum muscle could correspond to the same or to a similar variation of the parameter in the other muscles. The work presents results of Pearson's correlations between Longissimus lumborum samples and other muscle samples, such as Biceps femoris, Rectus femoris, Semimembranosus, Supraspinatus and Semitendinosus in horse meat. A total of 27 male IHDH (Italian Heavy Draught Horse) breed foals were employed. They were slaughtered at 11 months of age and the above-mentioned muscles were sampled. The Longissimus lumborum muscle showed to be representative of other muscles and of the whole carcass for some chemical parameters (moisture, protein and ash) and for some fatty acids profile patterns such as C12:0, C14:0, total monounsaturated fatty acid and polyunsaturated fatty acid, but poor correlations were recorded for intramuscular fat concentration, rheological and colorimetric parameters. Although almost all the qualitative parameters in meat are affected by the anatomical site and by the muscle, the Longissimus lumborum is often not representative in horse meat with regard to modifications of this parameters.

The present study investigated the physicochemical properties of pastirma prepared from beef, mutton, pork and horse meat. Left semimembranosus muscles from four carcasses of each species were processed into pastirma and the corresponding right muscles were used fresh for comparison. The proximate composition, pH, lipid oxidation, fatty acid profile and color of fresh and processed samples were determined. The shear force of the processed samples was also evaluated. The proximate composition varied among the meat types and greatly influenced by pastirma processing. Beef and pork pastirma had the highest protein content, while horse and mutton pastime had the highest fat content (P

African horse sickness (AHS) is well known as one of the worst diseases affecting horses out there. Just like both Ebola in people and African swine fever virus in pigs, it causes severe haemorrhage and oedema in all organ systems. Affected horses essentially suffocate as their lungs fill with fluid. The disease is caused by infection with African horse sickness virus (AHSV), which is transmitted between equids by certain species of Culicoides biting midges and is not thought to be transmitted by other means. Although currently confined to sub-Saharan Africa, the virus has a history of spreading outside Africa, where it has caused devastating outbreaks in the Middle East, as well as in Spain and Portugal. Given the recent northward expansion of the main African vector of AHSV ( Culicoides imicola ) into the Mediterranean basin of Europe, the threat posed from AHSV in Europe is increasing. We have known for some time that domestic dogs are capable of being infected with AHSV and, apart from horses, the domestic dog is the only other species known to contract the severe form of the disease.1,2 Until recently, in all reported field outbreaks in dogs, there have been well-documented histories of eating of horse meat, so it was thought that the dogs were most likely being infected through the ingestion of infected horse meat, rather than through the bites of infected Culicoides midges. This made dogs a dead-end host of the virus, so it was generally believed that they did not play a significant role in the …

In this study, a structured survey questionnaire was used to determine consumers' preferences and behavior with regard to horse meat at a horse meat restaurant located in Jeju, Korea, from October 1 to December 24, 2005. The questionnaire employed in this study consisted of 20 questions designed to characterize six general attributes: horse meat sensory property, physical appearance, health condition, origin, price, and other attributes. Of the 1370 questionnaires distributed, 1126 completed questionnaires were retained based on the completeness of the answers, representing an 82.2% response rate. Two issues were investigated that might facilitate the search for ways to improve horse meat production and marketing programs in Korea. The first step was to determine certain important factors, called principal components, which enabled the researchers to understand the needs of horse meat consumers via principal component analysis. The second step was to define consumer segments with regard to their preferences for horse meat, which was accomplished via cluster analysis. The results of the current study showed that health condition, price, origin, and leanness were the most critical physical attributes affecting the preferences of horse meat consumers. Four segments of consumers, with different demands for horse meat attributes, were identified: origin-sensitive consumers, price-sensitive consumers, quality and safety-sensitive consumers, and non-specific consumers. Significant differences existed among segments of consumers in terms of age, nature of work, frequency of consumption, and general level of acceptability of horse meat.

The objective of this study was to compare the chemical composition and physicochemical quality of the meat of mature slaughter horses (73 mares and 58 geldings) sampled from the longissimus dorsi (longissimus lumborum section [LL]) and semitendinosus (ST) muscles. The LL muscle was characterized by significantly lower values of electrical conductivity, temperature and shear force; however, it showed a significantly higher water-holding capacity. Meat from the LL muscle showed a significantly higher intramuscular fat (IMF) content, and as a result, higher calories, but contained less water and protein than the ST muscle. Along with the increasing marbling level, the IMF content in the LL muscle increased from 2.79 up to 13.30%, whereas in the ST muscle, from 2.80 up to 6.45%. Generally, a higher meat marbling goes together with a decrease of water and protein contents as well as an increase of a protein/fat ratio. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS On the basis of the obtained results, it was stated that the chemical composition and physicochemical quality of mature horses' meat was similar to some other species of red meat. Therefore, the horse flesh could be a valuable substitute of culinary meat, especially beef. The high dressing percentages reflected the horses' usefulness for meat production. Moreover, considering a slight number of defects occurring in horse meat (i.e. DFD or PSE), chevaline could be more widely used in the meat industry, in raw or processed form, as a suitable food for human consumption.

Overall, meat texture is composed of two types of toughness: primary toughness, because of mechanical resistance of the myofibrillar structure, and secondary toughness, by reason of connective tissue content. Primary toughness can be reduced during aging by intrinsic and extrinsic protease activity. Secondary toughness is determined by a given amount of epimysial and perimysial connective tissue, which cannot be reduced as no collagenases are naturally present in the muscle or produced by native meat microbial populations. The objective of this work was to study primary toughness reduction in meat from four animal species, i.e., beef, horse, rabbit and hen, employing M. Biceps femoris, by calpain activation with calcium chloride. Secondary toughness, expressed as hydroxyproline content, and contribution of both parameters to overall hardness were also studied. Marination with 150 mM CaCl2increased enzymatic activity in pre-rigor meat (horse and beef), but higher concentrations (250 mM) reduced enzymatic activity increments. Although beef marination considerably increased enzymatic activity, it did not reduce hardness, probably because of high collagen content. The high hydroxyproline concentration in beef and horse caused an overall hardness. Marinated horse meat had lower collagen content and a higher enzyme activity, resulting in less hard samples. As expected, pre-rigor meats, hen and rabbit, had low hardness values for both control and treated samples. Because CaCl2in high concentrations inhibits calpain activity, it was assumed that rabbit meat calpains were inhibited at concentrations as low as 150 mM. Therefore, calpains were active in control pre-rigor rabbit meat but were inactivated by CaCl2addition.

A stable hybridoma cell line (DD3) has been produced secreting a monoclonal antibody specific for horse muscle proteins. The DD3 monoclonal antibody (mAb) did not show significant cross-reactivity when tested against beef, chicken, pig and soya proteins or bovine caseins, gelatine and bovine serum albumin. The DD3 mAb was used in an indirect ELISA format for the detection of defined amounts of horse meat (10–500 g kg-1) in beef meat mixtures. Immunorecognition of monoclonal antibodies adsorbed to horse meat adsorbed onto the ELISA plate was made with rabbit anti-mouse immunoglobulins conjugated to the enzyme horseradish peroxidase. Subsequent enzymic conversion of the substrate gave clear optical density differences when assaying mixtures of minced beef containing different amounts of horse meat.

Immunoadsorption chromatography has been used to isolate horse-specific soluble muscle proteins from crude horse protein extracts. Horse-specific polyclonal antibodies against soluble horse muscle proteins immobilised on a Protein A-Sepharose CL-4B matrix were used to adsorb the corresponding antigens. Analysis of the crude soluble horse muscle proteins by sodium dodecyl sulphate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) showed the existence of 20 protein subunits in the gel. SDS-PAGE of the proteins recovered by affinity chromatography showed nine protein subunits, three of which were enriched after the immunopurification step. These affinity-recovered horse-specific soluble muscle proteins may be used as antigens in the development of monoclonal antibodies to detect and quantify horse meat in raw, unheated meat mixtures.

Antisera to myoglobins (Mb) isolated from ovine, porcine and equine muscles were used in agar-gel diffusion experiments to determine the presence of flesh from these species in beef products. Rabbit anti-ovine Mb serum was made monospecific by immunoabsorption, and then was used to detect the presence of lamb in fresh ground beef at the 3% level of adulteration. Goat anti-porcine Mb serum was used to detect the presence of pork in fresh ground beef at the 3% level and in ground beef adulterated at the 10% level and heated to 70°C. Rabbit anti-equine Mb serum was used to detect the presence of horse meat in heated beef sausages at the 3% level of adulteration.