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By Ing. Fabio G. Nunes , Poultry Processing Consultant, Curitiba, Brazil
Among the diseases that cause skin problems in broilers and turkeys, cellulitis is among the most important ones thanks to the severe economical losses the problem inflicts to the processing companies. Although the condition was first recognised in 1981 by Canada’s meat hygiene directives, the term cellulitis did not show up on condemnation records until 1986.Cellulitis ranked 10th among all condemnation categories in Canada that year, with only 160,405 chickens (0.048% of all slaughtered broilers) condemned for that reason. Ten years later, more than 2.6 million Canadian chickens affected with cellulitis (0.56% of total slaughter) did not pass inspection, a 12-fold increase in frequency. Cellulitis is now the first cause of condemnation in broiler chickens in Canada, which makes it a source of major financial losses. In addition, between 1991 and 1997 cellulitis was among the top-two causes of partial condemnation of turkey carcasses. Cellulitis is estimated to respond presently for the partial condemnation of 1.2% of the birds slaughtered in Canada.
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Source: World Poultry, volume 27, no. 1, 2011
