Kit for detecting meat adulteration

Food adulteration includes all operations that modify the natural composition of a food through the replacement of elements specific to the food with other foreign ones, the subtraction of elements specific to the food, or again, with the increase in the proportional quantity of one or more of its components. Adulterations have not only commercial consequences but often also hygienic-nutritional ones and, in some cases, pose a serious danger to public health. In the context of meat products, one type of food adulteration consists of the presence of meat of species other than those declared. Although this is mainly a commercial fraud, there may be health consequences for allergic or intolerant people and ethical-religious problems for people who consume some species of meat.

Kairosafe offers two types of tests to screen and determine contamination from meat of other species, the Raw Meat FlowThrough™ rapid test and the Raw Species-Check™ ELISA test.

Raw Meat FlowThrough™

It is a validated test for the detection of accidental contamination or adulteration of raw meat products, at a level of approximately 1%. It allows you to detect cow, horse, pig, poultry and sheep. The test is simple and quick and is performed on homogeneous samples, such as finely minced raw meat, or on work surfaces. The reliability of the test is such as to provide valid help in supporting an effective decision-making process.

Limit of detection

This qualitative test uses highly purified antibodies to detect species-specific animal proteins (albumin), which are found at high levels in raw meat (e.g. ground meat), meat products (e.g. meatballs) and blood. The limit of detection (LOD) of the test depends somewhat on the type and quality of the sample and the efficiency of the extraction process. The 1% LOD in raw ground beef was verified against LGC Reference Materials and confirmatory ELISA tests.

Test procedure

The Raw Meat FlowThrough™ test takes place in 6 steps which take 12 minutes. for the execution. The species-specific proteins are extracted from a homogeneous sample (e.g. finely minced meat) with the aid of an extraction solution. The extract is diluted and added to the test cartridge, which has a test spot and a control spot. After adding a reagent, the two spots turn pink to indicate a positive test and correct functioning of the test respectively.

Raw Species-Check™ ELISA

ELISA test for the semi-quantitative detection of very low levels of raw meat in foods (e.g. ingredients/finished meat products) and surfaces. It allows you to detect cow, horse, pig, poultry and sheep. The test has a nominal range of::

• 0.1% w/w - 0.5% w/w in food samples.

• 1.0% w/w - 5.0% w/w in food samples diluted 1/10.

• 0.01% w/v - 0.05% w/v in solutions derived from surface sampling

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