What lessons should we take away from this episode? Obviously, we should salute Colorado’s public-health officials. Their timely recognition of this outbreak likely prevented additional cases. But there’s a larger lesson: recalls are no panacea. While such actions are important, do they alter the risk regarding E. coli O157:H7 infection and our food supply? I’m afraid the answer is no.
Most people desperately want to believe that someone else will look out for them. We’d like to believe that just as we can drive over a bridge and not have to get out of the car and check it for safety, we can be equally confident that the government has declared our food safe. But it’s not that easy. Despite our improvements in preventing E. coli O157:H7 contamination in our meat supply, I believe the problem is still present. This is not meant as a criticism either of those who raise and produce beef or of the public-health community. It’s simply very difficult to eliminate this organism from all red meat. Unfortunately, the current recall reinforces the impression that government can fully protect us against contamination of our food supply, and that when problems do occur, they’ll quickly be fixed. The truth is quite the opposite.
Consider Minnesota. In our state we have the highest reported rates of E. coli O157:H7 infection among the 50 states, and yet, remarkably, we have not been part of any of the recent major national outbreaks. These include the Jack in the Box outbreak, the Odwalla fruit juice outbreak, a recent outbreak involving alfalfa sprouts and now the Hudson Foods outbreak. So how come we have the highest rates of infection? The answer: these well-publicized outbreaks represent only a very small part of the problem nationwide. In Minnesota we have traced most E. coli infection to less dramatic but equally dangerous situations: undercooked hamburger (with pink meat in the middle) from multiple sources, consumption of unpasteurized milk, contact with farm animals and disease transmission in day-care settings. While we haven’t been able to identify the risk associated with fresh produce, recent outbreaks have demonstrated that fruit and vegetables may also play a role in the E. coli problem.
So what can we do? There’s been a cry for more inspectors and testing. But neither is a magic bullet. Contamination of our meat supply with E. coli O157:H7 occurs every day, although the problem is sporadic, and the level of contamination may be very low. For that reason, routine testing of the product will not provide us with a reliable way to detect every single episode of contamination. It’s like sticking your hand in one part of the haystack and saying the whole stack is free of needles. For this reason, the media should dispense with its interrogation of Department of Agriculture officials about why they didn’t manage to find the problem at the Hudson Foods plant before the outbreak.
There is one major step we, as a society, can take toward producing safer food. The answer is irradiation, which attacks bacteria with low-level radiation. While irradiation doesn’t replace the tools we are already using to ensure the safety of red meat, it is the critical missing piece in reducing the risk of illness. It’s not some new gimmick that will, in 20 years, turn out to be dangerous. The use of ionizing irradiation to pasteurize food has been extensively evaluated. It’s supported by the World Health Organization and various other international agencies, scientists and government officials. It’s already used in virtually all of our spices. Irradiation offers the best chance of substantially reducing bacterial and parasitic contamination in food. It can be used in a variety of foods, including red meat, poultry, pork and fresh fruit and vegetables. The FDA has already approved the use of irradiation for many of these food items. A petition is now before the FDA to approve the irradiation of red meat. It could prove to be as significant a development in public health as was pasteurization of milk, chlorination of water or immunization–the practices that helped raise life expectancy from 48 years in 1900 to 76 today.
Ironically, the food industry remains reluctant to use this valuable tool. They fear the wrath of activist groups who wrongly claim that irradiation is unsafe. They know consumers might be wary of irradiated products. But if the paranoia prevails, we will have failed to heed the most important lesson of the Hudson Foods outbreak.
