As of mid-September, people have been reporting symptoms such as fever and abdominal cramps lasting four days to a week. These symptoms were soon found to be a result of eating tainted food containing salmonella.

An investigation done by the Minnesota Department of Health suggested the source of the salmonella outbreak is King Nut brand peanut butter and peanut paste made by the Peanut Corporation of America.

Although this brand is not known to be distributed for retail sale, it is used in bulk at places such as hospitals, restaurants and schools.

NIU is not one of the schools affected by the salmonella outbreak.

“We use Skippy brand [in the dining halls],” said director of residential dining Ralph Chaplin. “We do not have any affected items.”

The Center for Disease Control states that there are 180 plus products made with peanut butter or paste from the Peanut Corporation of America.

With the variance of recalled products, many establishments have been affected, said Christel Springmire, environmental health practitioner from the DeKalb County Health Department.

“The products that have been made [with ingredients containing salmonella] may be on store shelves or may have been on store shelves,” Springmire said.

Springmire said the DeKalb County Board of Health takes an active roll in food safety in the county.

“We assist in every recall that would affect food safety in DeKalb County,” Springmire said. “If it’s something that would directly affect public health, for example like a disease that may be, through testing, found to be in the food, we would call, visit or put out an e-mail.”

Tom Inboden of Inboden’s Meats Ltd., 1106 N First St., said Inboden’s did not carry any of the foods affected in the recall and made every effort to make sure none of their products were tainted.

“We do not [carry any of the foods affected in the recall]. What we have done is contacted our vendors to make sure we’re not part of that chain,” Inboden said. “So far, the information that has come back to us is that we’re not.”

Inboden said in case of a recall, Inboden’s knows the protocol to follow.

“We’d pull the product off of the shelf and segregate it, mark it ‘Do Not Sell’ and eventually reverse the supply chain,” Inboden said.

Springmire said it is in the consumer’s best interest to research the recalls themselves.

“Keep your ear to the reporting on the news when you hear about recalls,” Springmire said.