Students in several schools in Maine were inadvertantly served green beans that were infested with small worms, and a second shipment of contaminated green beans has been discovered in Massachusetts.
Christine Youngclaus, a food-program specialist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (usda) regional food and nutrition service, said the Massachusetts shipment had not left the school district’s warehouse when the infestation was discovered.
However, all the schools in Maine that participate in the national school-lunch program had received cases of the green beans, which were contaminated with corn borers, said a spokesman for the state’s department of education. Local school officials were sent a memorandum “alerting them to the infestation problem,” she added.
Ms. Youngclaus said the green beans, which were canned by the Draper King Cole Corp. in Delaware, were purchased by the usda She said the company has since replaced the contaminated shipment.