9781422280447

Food safety

The virus can spread from person to person, or by consuming contaminated food or water. Norovirus can also spread if a person touches an infected surface. The virus settles in a person’s gut, causing inf lammation of the stomach and intestines. Norovirus usually results in intense pain, vomiting, and diarrhea. The incident was just the latest in a brutal year for Chipotle. Customers who ate at the company’s restaurants in California, Maryland, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Washington State had earlier come down with Escherichia coli (or E. coli ), a bacterium that causes food poisoning. Simi Valley, California, restaurant- goers were infected with norovirus, while in Minnesota, 64 Chipotle customers were sickened after eating tomatoes contaminated with the bacteria Salmonella . As 2015 came to an end, more than 350 people had become sick at Chipotle restaurants across the country. Yet Chipotle wasn’t the only restaurant whose food made some people sick. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), restaurants account for 60 percent of all foodborne disease outbreaks, while 12 percent come from individual homes. I s Y our F ood S afe ? Almost every day, the news is filled with stories of E. coli , Salmonella , Listeria (another type of bacteria), or some other foodborne contaminant. In fact, given the hype such stories receive, you might wonder if any foods are safe to eat. The CDC estimates that 48 million people in the United States are sickened by foodborne diseases each year, while 128,000 are hospitalized. The CDC reports that foodborne diseases kill 3,000 people every year. While these numbers might seem high, the U.S. food supply is one of the safest in the world. Less than 1 percent of every meal eaten in the United States results in sickness. That’s quite an accomplishment, considering that food can become contaminated at any time: on the farm, in processing factories, or in the distribution

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