If you’re going to eat a walrus, make sure it’s well done, CDC warns

If walrus is in your dinner plans, the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention recommends you make sure it’s well done.

The federal health agency warned of the effects of undercooked game meat after two outbreaks of trichinosis over the last year in western Alaska. The outbreaks sickened 10 people and all have fully recovered.

It was the first multiple-case outbreaks of trichinosis associated with walrus, which can only be hunted by Alaska Natives for subsistence or handicraft purposes, since 1992.

The CDC in its weekly online morbidity and mortality report dated July 7 urged health care givers to consider consumption of wild game when evaluating suspected trichinosis cases.

Trichinosis is contracted by eating raw or undercooked meat from animals infected with a microscopic roundworm. High heat kills the parasite.

Historically, the disease was most frequently associated with eating undercooked pork. Since the late 1990s, wild game is the suspected cause in most cases.

Often in Alaska, it’s black bear or polar bear meat. However, among the 241 trichinosis cases reported in Alaska since 1975, 24 were associated with eating undercooked seal and 100 were tied to walrus.