The International Food Safety Authorities Network (INFOSAN) is a group of national authorities from 186 member states, managed by FAO and WHO.
Twelve events involved a biological hazard (Listeria monocytogenes (six), Salmonella (two), Cronobacter sakazakii, Hepatitis A virus, Norovirus and Clostridium botulinum (all one).
Cases also involved chemical hazard (arsenic), undeclared allergen (peanuts) and physical hazard (rodent contamination).
Categories most commonly cited were milk or dairy products (four), meat and meat products, snacks and other dessert food (both three), fruit and fruit products (two), fish and other seafood, nuts and oilseeds, sugar and confectionery and unknown (all one).
Two events that began in 2017 and continued into 2018 were an outbreak of salmonellosis in France linked to domestically produced infant formula that was exported to more than 80 countries and an outbreak of Listeriosis in South Africa linked to domestic ready-to-eat meat products exported to 15 countries.
The INFOSAN Secretariat and colleagues in Canada also ran an eight-part webinar series in French.
The series covered topics from a Canadian perspective: foodborne outbreak investigation; food safety investigation; health risk assessment; the food recall system; the enteric outbreak toolkit and foodborne disease surveillance.
INFOSAN members from 23 countries registered to attend at least one webinar.