Apple juice  Apple juice is a fruit juice made by the maceration and pressing of an apple. The resulting expelled juice may be further treated by enzymatic and centrifugal clarification to remove the starch and pectin, which holds fine particulate in suspension, and then pasteurized for packaging in glass, metal or aseptic processing system containers, or further treated by dehydration processes to a concentrate. Due to the complex and costly equipment required to extract and clarify juice from apples in large volume, apple juice is normally produced commercially. In the United States, unfiltered fresh apple juice is made by smaller operations in areas of high apple production, in the form of unclarified apple cider. Apple juice is one of the most common fruit juices in the world, with world production led by China, Poland, the United States, and Germany. Apples used for apple juice are usually harvested between September and mid-November in the Northern Hemisphere and between February to mid April in the Southern Hemisphere. A common cultivar used for apple juice is the McIntosh. Approximately two medium McIntosh apples produce around of juice. After the apples are picked, they are washed and transported to the processing facility. The apples are then pressed and juiced right away to avoid spoilage. Depending on the company and end-product, the apples can be processed in different ways before pressing. Apple juice is then filtered, with the quantity of solid particles remaining partly defining the difference between apple juice and apple cider. In cases where the apple juice is treated enzymatically, the typical class of enzymes used are pectinases. Because apple juice is acidic, typically with a pH of 3.4, it can be pasteurized for less time or at lower temperatures than many other juices. For this purpose, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration recommends the following thermal processing times and temperatures in order to achieve a 5-log reduction of Cryptosporidium parvum as this parasite is more heat resistant than :   From 2000 to 2010 there were over 1700 cases in North America of illnesses related to drinking unpasteurized juice and ciders. The pathogens related to these food-borne illnesses included parasites, bacteria, and viruses. The most common pathogens were "" and 0111, "Salmonella", "Cryptosporidium", "Clostridium botulinum", and Hepatitis A. Pathogens can be spread in a number of ways, such as contamination where the fruit is grown, being carried in contaminated containers, or due to poor handling and washing.