Food Safety Talk 35: The Abuelas of Social Media

Don was excited about his new “Dan Benjamin approved” microphone and headphones and Ben was excited about Folding Text. After emailing with Marco, from the Neutral podcast, Don is planning on moving Food Safety Talk to Squarespace 6, which should allow them to get better download tracking information. Don and Ben also sent shout-outs to David Tharp (IAFP), Ian Jenson (Meat and Livestock Australia) and Renee Boyer’s Food Safety class.

The discussion then returned to the reusable bag discussion (see FST 34), which was prompted by Tomas Aragon who shared his memo about the “Clickety-Clack” paper. In the memo Thomas pointed out that Klick and Wright had used the ICD-10 codes, for which there were 140 deaths during 2000-2010. However, 111 of these were due to Enterocolitis due to Clostridium difficile, leaving only 29 related to other intestinal infectious diseases.

The guys took a quick pop culture detour to iTunes Match which had allowed Ben to rediscover Rancid. Don’s been listening to R. L. Burnside (not R. L. Stine), Bite Harder: The Music De Wolfe Studio Sampler, Vol. 2 and Holy F*ck.

On return to food safety they guys discussed an article on Farmers Markets and FSMA and in particular the quote from Kate Flannery. Ben disagreed with Kate’s implication that greenhouse farming was without risks. Don agreed that the risks were different rather than non-existent.

The guys then turned to the horse meat scandal in the UK, which is even reverberating through the popular culture twittersphere. Ben challenged Prof. Hugh Pennington’s comments that horse meat was safer than beef, as surely the denominator matters!

The discussion then turned to barbeque and roadkill. While you’ll find some vaguely disturbing erotic images you probably won’t find a road kill recipe on the Amazing Ribs website. Ben did discuss the safety of eating road kill in this barfblog article. Road kill is apparently making a resurgence with those who are struggling with food security (i.e. having enough food to eat). Don has worked with Debra Palmer Keenan to help people make better choices in relation to food safety when they have to compromise on the foods they buy.

Don had some more follow up from FST 34 in relation to washing coffee mugs. He found some silly advice in this Huffington Post article and he expressed his disgust with this Mamapedia article. This got Ben excited as his grad student, Ben, is working on how to engage people in food safety via social media. Ben’s research will focus on mommy blogs (but probably not Dani’s 2 Little Supeheroes blog or Portlandia's Parenting tips over the coming months.

The discussion then turned to Doug’s poop cruise article and that someone sold a bio poop bag on Ebay for $15. Another Barfblog article reported on the closure of Union University in Jackson, Tennessee, due to norovirus and Don contemplated the irony of this happening at North Carolina State University, the home of the NoroCORE project.

In the after dark the guys talked about beverages, iTunes Match and MobileMe, and Ben had some questions about establishing variances to food safety standards.

Food Safety Talk 33: Fresh Produce Punk Rock Hippieness

Don starts by battling Skype again while Ben gets organized. The guys shared their favorite Starbucks coffee orders, which Don takes to go in his Marco-approved ™ Contigo travel mug. While these mugs can be challenging to wash, the guys agreed that washing them (or other dishes) in the bathroom was never a good idea. Even John Gruber knows that storing dishes in the bathroom is a bad idea, as he pointed out in a recent episode of The Talk Show. Ben then went into a coffee-fuelled rant about Getting Things Done, his favorite Canadian TV series ‘The Newsroom’, The Lumineers, Bad Religion and The Wire’s Stringer Bell. Don countered with Fat Boy Slim, the Luther, Bramwell, Ripper Street, and Transmetropolitan.

After a shout-out to Renee Boyer’s Food Safety class at Virginia Tech they talked about listener Bridgette’s link to “Dear Abby - Changing baby on eatery table takes the cake” and her comment that perhaps that common sense isn’t that common at all.

Next on the agenda was a discussion of the recent CDC report on foodborne disease attribution and how fresh produce is associated with greatest amount of foodborne illness, while poultry is linked to the greatest number of deaths. Don explained how the MDP’s retail sampling results match up reasonably well with actual illness estimates, according to his crude risk assessment. Ben was looking for information on what people could do to reduce the risks, as Don recently shared on WebMD. Ben was also surprise by the amount of deaths associated with norovirus (shown in the Technical Appendix 1 of the CDC report), the majority of which are associated with nursing homes. As the guys dug deeper into the results they unearthed more questions than answers and they cautioned against blindly trusting data.  As Don learned from reading Chumbawuba liner notes.

Ben and Don then discussed the recent Food Safety News article “Does The “No Illnesses” Language Belong in Recall Notices?” and whether the wording impacts on how consumers react.

The focus then turned to the FSIS “Let's Talk Chicken” podcast. The guys found the scripted nature very difficult to connect with. Instead they found CDC’s approach in “Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse” much more engaging. Don felt that passion was important in podcasting and cited the Obsession times Voice talk by Merlin Mann and John Gruber at SXSW.  Don also noted that he listens to Neutral, and his new favorite podcast, for the voice, and not the content.

In the after dark the guys chatted about using American Apparel for making T-shirts, creating Food Safety Talk Decals, iPads, Ben’s hockey obsession and 2 Little Superheroes.

Food Safety Talk 33: Fresh Produce and Punk Rock Hippieness