The CDC says this is the largest listeriosis outbreak since 2011.

The article states that these horrendous, disgusting infractions of health regulations have been documented out for at least the previous year, but given their severity, I’d imagine it’s always been this way at Boar’s Head production facilities.

I’m going to cook my deli meats from now on, no matter where they come from.

  • talEnglish
    48·
    4 months ago

    You can cook everything you eat if you want, and it’d probably reduce the number of microbes you get exposed to.

    However, you’re going to be foregoing stuff like fresh vegetables. Those are a factor via which disease can and has traveled. But it’s something that I don’t particularly want to give up.

    Raw milk is a listeria vector, and some cheeses made from it – especially those imported from Europe – make use of raw milk. That’s probably avoidable.

    • oce 🐆@jlai.lu
      5·
      4 months ago

      French people would rather die than give up on raw milk cheese, such death would probably be celebrated.

      • talEnglish
        34·
        4 months ago

        Yeah. Hmm.

        Well, you can’t heat treat it without making it not raw, but I guess it might be possible to kill listeria via irradiation, the way meats can be treated.

        I don’t know if there are any restrictions on how large a cheese can be before that’s impractical. Probably costs more than pasteurization.

        kagis

        Sounds like it does work on listeria.

        https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15726975/

        Ionizing radiation can be effective in controlling the growth of food spoilage and foodborne pathogenic bacteria. This study reports on an investigation of the effectiveness of irradiation treatment to eliminate Listeria monocytogenes on laboratory-inoculated broccoli, cabbage, tomatoes, and mung bean sprouts. Irradiation of broccoli and mung bean sprouts at 1.0 kGy resulted in reductions of approximately 4.88 and 4.57 log CFU/g, respectively, of a five-strain cocktail of L. monocytogenes. Reductions of approximately 5.25 and 4.14 log CFU/g were found with cabbage and tomato, respectively, at a similar dose. The appearance, color, texture, taste, and overall acceptability did not undergo significant changes after 7 days of postirradiation storage at 4 degrees C, in comparison with control samples. Therefore, low-dose ionizing radiation treatment could be an effective method for eliminating L. monocytogenes on fresh and fresh-cut produce.