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Tag: food safety

  • Will the MAHA Moms Turn on Trump?

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    Earlier this month, the wellness entrepreneur Calley Means delivered opening remarks at a symposium called “The Future of Farming: Exploring a Pro-Health, Pro-Farmer Agenda,” held in Washington, D.C., at the Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank. Means is prominent in Make America Healthy Again, the clean-eating, vaccine-skeptical movement that opposes corruption in the food, pharmaceutical, and agricultural industries. He is also a top adviser to MAHA’s patron saint, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., now the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Means gave a brief, somewhat flustered speech that barely touched on farming. Instead, he rehashed various MAHA talking points: that the United States is “the sickest country in the world,” that we spend more money on worse health outcomes than any other developed nation, and that most of the diseases plaguing Americans are caused by the terrible ultra-processed food we eat.

    Means also noted some “initial wins” on the food front during Kennedy’s first six months of leading H.H.S. A growing number of Big Food corporations are voluntarily removing artificial dyes from their products, for example. And a dozen states and counting have placed various restrictions on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits to prohibit the purchase of soda, other sweetened beverages, and candy.

    What Means didn’t address is how these relatively minor changes balance out against other, far more sweeping and consequential anti-MAHA measures taken by the ostensibly pro-MAHA Trump Administration. The Environmental Protection Agency, for instance, is seeking reapproval for banned pesticides and has lowered standards on forever chemicals in air, water, and soil. The Department of Agriculture ended two programs, totalling almost a billion dollars in funding, that helped schools and food banks make purchases from local and organic farms. And although Means—who has no medical, nutrition, or public-health credentials—has said that he’d like to “fire every single nutrition scientist in the government,” some of the more moderate MAHA rank and file may also blanch at the DOGE-driven purging of U.S.D.A. scientists and food-safety inspectors, or at the National Institutes of Health cancelling hundreds of millions of dollars in research grants related to MAHA priorities such as nutrition, chronic disease, and mental health.

    Means acknowledged that some MAHA adherents may be dismayed by the “pace of political change” thus far under the second Trump Administration. “I would suggest, as we’re frustrated, we don’t attack Secretary Kennedy and President Trump,” he advised. “They are fighting against a deep state that is unimaginable and entrenched economic interests and entrenched dysfunction that is impossible to comprehend, and they are our warriors here.” And yet, despite the shadowy forces aligned against the nation’s top health official and the President of the United States, the underdogs, he insisted, are winning: “We have achieved—the Trump Administration—I believe, the most significant food-policy reform in America.”

    Critics of the MAHA movement, and of wellness culture writ large, often compare it to a cult, and this kind of rhetoric suggests why. The leader should not be criticized; a vast conspiracy threatens the movement; triumph is ongoing, even if the movement’s crusade against dangerous pesticides and heavy metals in the soil and drinking water has culminated in the election of a President who apparently loves all that stuff. The “MAHA moms,” who helped return Trump to the White House and lifted Kennedy into a Cabinet position, see a kind of messianic power in the Secretary—for some of them, he is, quite literally, their faith healer. “If Kennedy is able to do what he wants to do as the head of the H.H.S., we won’t even need health care,” Zen Honeycutt, the founder of the nonprofit Moms Across America, said in December. “I’m saying we won’t be going to the doctor’s because we won’t be sick.”

    In recent weeks, however, the MAHA flock has experienced rapidly intensifying cognitive dissonance. On a recent episode of the podcast “Why Should I Trust You?,” Honeycutt, discussing the rollbacks on regulations concerning pesticides and heavy metals, said, “I’m horrified as a mother who is working constantly to try to reduce the toxic exposure to my children and to the children all across the country.” On another podcast, “Culture Apothecary,” its host, Alex Clark, an influencer who is affiliated with the conservative nonprofit Turning Point USA, asked, “Did President Trump just hand legal immunity to pesticide companies?” She was referring to Republican-backed legislation, currently pending in the House, that would shield pesticide manufacturers from lawsuits; Clark’s guest, the clean-farming advocate Kelly Ryerson, called the bill “the most enormous slap in the face to MAHA.”

    It was probably not the last. On August 15th, the Times obtained a draft of a forthcoming White House report on children’s health, “Make Our Children Healthy Again Strategy,” later published in full by Politico. The paper—a follow-up to a MAHA “assessment,” released in May, that was later found to have numerous made-up or garbled citations—mentions the scourge of ultra-processed foods only once, specifies virtually no concrete action on improving food safety and nutrition, and calls the E.P.A.’s existing regulatory process “robust.” The draft reads like a castration-by-bureaucracy of the MAHA revolution—multiple instances of “task force,” “initiative,” “framework,” “collaboration,” and, best of all, “harmonizing authorization processes.” Again and again, it proposes that more research is needed—just not the research that was under way before Kennedy came to H.H.S. (The new MAHA report repeats Kennedy’s vow that he will soon find the “root causes of autism”; according to ProPublica, the N.I.H. has terminated some forty million dollars in grants for autism-related research, including studies on the possible links between autism and exposure to pollution and forever chemicals.)

    But the appeal of Kennedy was that he’d already done his own research, and that his conclusions were beyond doubt. “Pesticides, food additives, pharmaceutical drugs, and toxic waste permeate every cell of our bodies,” he said last year. “This assault on our children’s cells and hormones is unrelenting.” He promised a counter-assault, and the MAHA strategy report resembles an instrument of surrender.

    During the 2024 election cycle, the top five PACs affiliated with agribusiness companies made more than seventy-one million dollars in campaign donations, almost all of which went to Republican candidates and groups. Trump’s 2024 reëlection PAC received ten million dollars from the multinational conglomerate British American Tobacco, which farms an especially polluting, soil-depleting, and pesticide-intensive crop, and which has been sued for profiting from child labor. (The case is pending trial.)

    The simple political fact is that these corporate donors are more important to Trump than MAHA moms are. “If the Trump Administration went after agriculture and food companies, the ripple effects throughout Republican House districts, in particular, will be pretty major,” Christopher Bosso, a professor of public policy and political science at Northeastern University, told me. Republicans, he added, will likely have to wage their midterm campaigns without the support of a newly irate and activated MAHA coalition. “I doubt that MAHA has staying power within the Trump ecosystem,” Bosso said. “Unless Trump wants to expend serious political capital against one of his most loyal constituencies, I can’t see reforming the food system getting very far beyond the on-the-margins, performative kind of stuff.”

    The most prominent of these marginal reforms has been the removal of some dyes from mass-produced foods, a development that Honeycutt, Ryerson, and other MAHA influencers have loudly celebrated. But “even if a Nutri-Grain bar doesn’t have food dyes, it’s still a Nutri-Grain bar,” Juliana Cohen, a professor of nutrition and director of the Center for Health Innovation, Research, and Policy at Merrimack College, told me. “It’s not like it’s no longer ultra-processed because they took out the Red 40.” (And, in any case, no self-respecting MAHA mom would let her kid anywhere near a Nutri-Grain bar in the first place.)

    Swapping out one dye for another, Cohen went on, “is akin to placing a filter on a cigarette, when we should be thinking about policies that prevent kids from smoking in the first place. We have to think strategically about how to reduce ultra-processed foods and make nutritious foods more accessible and affordable for everyone.” One way not to do that—to take yet another example from this Administration—would be to end the Patrick Leahy Farm to School Grant Program, which started during President Barack Obama’s second term and came to a close in March, when the U.S.D.A. abolished it.

    On “Culture Apothecary,” Ryerson speculated that Republican indifference to MAHA will hurt them in the 2026 midterm elections. “They are completely underestimating what this bloc of young conservatives want and expect out of our elected officials,” she said. But it may be more accurate to say that MAHA grossly overestimated the potential transformative power of Kennedy’s appointment to H.H.S.

    If MAHA influencers are finally waking up to elected Republicans’ contempt for much of their project, they are also emphatic that they do not see Kennedy as complicit or culpable in how Congress, Trump, or other Cabinet officials have betrayed their promises to the movement. It’s as if Kennedy alone had been vaccinated against the corrupting virus that infects everyone around him. (Kennedy has undeniably delivered on behalf of MAHA’s anti-vaccine constituency, through acts such as dismissing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s entire vaccine-safety panel and scrapping half a billion dollars in funding for mRNA vaccine development.)

    The moral firewall around Kennedy is illustrated by the case of glyphosate, an herbicide so singularly reviled by MAHA that, on social media, Ryerson goes by the Glyphosate Girl. Glyphosate is often categorized as carcinogenic and as an endocrine-disrupting chemical; for years, Kennedy contended that it causes non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and, in 2018, he was part of the legal team that won a two-hundred-and-eighty-nine-million-dollar settlement from Monsanto on behalf of a terminally ill man who was exposed to glyphosate in one of its products. Yet, in May, Kennedy indicated that the Administration would not move to restrict glyphosate in the U.S. “One hundred per cent of corn in this country relies on glyphosate,” he said. “We are not going to do anything to jeopardize that business model.” Few in MAHA appeared to raise any strong objections.

    Of course, it’s the E.P.A. that decides how pesticides are regulated; it’s the U.S.D.A., now overseen by the self-proclaimed MAHA mom Brooke Rollins, that administers farm-to-school grants, soil-health initiatives, and other MAHA-friendly programs that have been pulverized during her brief tenure at the agency. These distinctions did not seem to matter much at the time Kennedy was nominated to lead H.H.S.—back when leading supporters, such as Vani Hari, a.k.a. the Food Babe, were suggesting that Kennedy could single-handedly reform and purify America’s food systems—but they appear to matter now. On “Why Should I Trust You?,” when Honeycutt expressed horror at MAHA’s fate under Trump, she took pains not to project that horror at Kennedy. Her belief in what she calls “the magic of Bobby Kennedy” is undimmed: “He is compassionate, he’s brilliant, he’s humble, and he’s collaborative.”

    He is also, within the current MAHA narrative, surprisingly powerless on many issues. On August 16th, the nonprofit MAHA Action posted an upbeat news roundup to Instagram with the caption “Maha had some huge wins this week and we’re here to break it all down.” One of these supposed victories—that the government is “no longer bribing hospitals” to vaccinate their staff—appeared to be misstated; in fact, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services simply revoked a rule requiring hospitals to track COVID-19 vaccination rates among their workers. Among the other “wins,” according to MAHA Action: U.S. Customs officials seized three tons of suspicious meat from China, and Secretary Kennedy went to the gym. ♦

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    Jessica Winter

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  • Testing rules out beef patties as the source of E. coli outbreak, McDonald’s says

    Testing rules out beef patties as the source of E. coli outbreak, McDonald’s says

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    LOS ANGELES — McDonald’s announced Sunday that Quarter Pounders will again be on its menu at hundreds of its restaurants after testing ruled out beef patties as the source of the outbreak of E. coli poisoning tied to the popular burgers that killed one person and sickened at least 75 others across 13 states.

    The U.S. Food and Drug Administration continues to believe that slivered onions from a single supplier are the likely source of contamination, McDonald’s said in a statement. It said it will resume selling the Quarter Pounder at affected restaurants —- without slivered onions — in the coming week.

    As of Friday, the outbreak had expanded to at least 75 people sick in 13 states, federal health officials said. A total of 22 people had been hospitalized, and two developed a dangerous kidney disease complication, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. One person has died in Colorado.

    Early information analyzed by the FDA showed that uncooked slivered onions used on the burgers “are a likely source of contamination,” the agency said. McDonald’s has confirmed that Taylor Farms, a California-based produce company, was the supplier of the fresh onions used in the restaurants involved in the outbreak, and that they had come from a facility in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

    McDonald’s pulled the Quarter Pounder burger from menus in several states — mostly in the Midwest and Mountain states — when the outbreak was announced Tuesday. McDonald’s said Friday that slivered onions from the Colorado Springs facility were distributed to approximately 900 of its restaurants, including some in transportation hubs like airports.

    The company said it removed slivered onions sourced from that facility from its supply chain on Tuesday. McDonald’s said it has decided to stop sourcing onions from Taylor Farms’ Colorado Springs facility “indefinitely.”

    The 900 McDonald’s restaurants that normally received slivered onions from Taylor Farms’ Colorado Springs facility will resume sales of Quarter Pounders without slivered onions, McDonald’s said.

    Testing by the Colorado Department of Agriculture ruled out beef patties as the source of the outbreak, McDonald’s said.

    The department of agriculture received multiple lots of fresh and frozen beef patties collected from various Colorado McDonald’s locations associated with the E. coli investigation. All samples were found to be negative for E. coli, the department said.

    Taylor Farms said Friday that it had preemptively recalled yellow onions sent to its customers from its Colorado facility and continues to work with the CDC and the FDA as they investigate.

    While it remains unclear if the recalled onions were the source of the outbreak, several other fast-food restaurants — including Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, KFC and Burger King — pulled onions from some menus in certain areas this week.

    Colorado had the most illnesses reported as of Friday, with 26 cases. At least 13 people were sickened in Montana, 11 in Nebraska, 5 each in New Mexico and Utah, 4 each in Missouri and Wyoming, two in Michigan and one each in Iowa, Kansas, Oregon, Wisconsin and Washington, the CDC reported.

    McDonald’s said Friday it didn’t pull the Quarter Pounder from any additional restaurants and noted that some cases in states outside the original region were tied to travel.

    The CDC said some people who got sick reported traveling to other states before their symptoms started. At least three people said they ate at McDonald’s during their travel. Illnesses were reported between Sept. 27 and Oct. 11.

    The outbreak involves infections with E. coli 0157:H7, a type of bacteria that produces a dangerous toxin. It causes about 74,000 infections in the U.S. annually, leading to more than 2,000 hospitalizations and 61 deaths each year, according to CDC.

    Symptoms of E. coli poisoning can occur quickly, within a day or two of eating contaminated food. They typically include fever, vomiting, diarrhea or bloody diarrhea and signs of dehydration — little or no peeing, increased thirst and dizziness. The infection is especially dangerous for children younger than 5, people who are elderly, pregnant or who have weakened immune systems.

    —-

    Associated Press writer JoNel Aleccia contributed reporting from Temecula, Calif.

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  • Deadly E. coli outbreak linked to McDonald’s Quarter Pounders sickens 49 people in 10 states

    Deadly E. coli outbreak linked to McDonald’s Quarter Pounders sickens 49 people in 10 states

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    E. coli food poisoning linked to McDonald’s Quarter Pounder hamburgers has sickened at least 49 people in 10 states, including one person who died and 10 who were hospitalized, federal health officials said Tuesday.

    The death was reported in an older person in Colorado, and one child has been hospitalized with severe kidney complications, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

    Infections were reported between Sept. 27 and Oct. 11, in Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Oregon, Utah, Wisconsin and Wyoming. Colorado has the most cases, 26, followed by Nebraska with nine.

    Everyone interviewed in connection with the outbreak had reported eating at McDonald’s before falling ill and most mentioned eating Quarter Pounder hamburgers, the CDC said. The U.S. Agriculture Department, the Food and Drug Administration and state health officials are also investigating.

    A specific ingredient has not been identified as the cause, but investigators are focused on onions and beef. A preliminary FDA investigation suggests that slivered onions served on the burgers are a likely source of contamination. The USDA is investigating the hamburger patties.

    In a statement, McDonald’s officials said that initial findings suggest that some illnesses are linked to onions sourced from a single supplier. The company has halted distribution of the slivered onions and temporarily removed the Quarter Pounder from menus in the affected states, and also in portions of Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico and Oklahoma.

    “We take food safety extremely seriously and it’s the right thing to do,” the statement said.

    E. coli bacteria are harbored in the guts of animals and found in the environment. Infections can cause severe illness, including fever, stomach cramps and bloody diarrhea. People who develop symptoms of E. coli poisoning should seek health care immediately and tell the provider what they ate.

    The news comes in an already tough year for the Chicago-based McDonald’s chain. Its global same-store sales fell for the first time in nearly four years in the second quarter as inflation-weary customers skipped eating out or chose cheaper options. The company responded with a $5 meal deal, which was introduced at U.S. restaurants in late June and was recently extended through December. The deal doesn’t include the Quarter Pounder.

    McDonald’s shares dropped 9% in after-hours trading Tuesday after the CDC’s announcement.

    The type of bacteria implicated in this outbreak, E. coli O157:H7, causes about 74,000 infections in the U.S. each year, leading to more than 2,000 hospitalizations and 61 deaths. Infections are especially dangerous for children younger than 5 and can cause acute kidney failure.

    ___

    Associated Press writer Dee-Ann Durbin in Detroit contributed to this story.

    ___

    The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • Listeria recall grows to 12 million pounds of meat and poultry, some of it sent to US schools

    Listeria recall grows to 12 million pounds of meat and poultry, some of it sent to US schools

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    A nationwide recall of meat and poultry products potentially contaminated with listeria has expanded to nearly 12 million pounds and now includes ready-to-eat meals sent to U.S. schools, restaurants and major retailers, federal officials said.

    The updated recall includes prepared salads, burritos and other foods sold at stores including Costco, Trader Joe’s, Target, Walmart and Kroger. The meat used in those products was processed at a Durant, Oklahoma, manufacturing plant operated by BrucePac. The Woodburn, Oregon-based company sells precooked meat and poultry to industrial, foodservice and retail companies across the country.

    Routine testing found potentially dangerous listeria bacteria in samples of BrucePac chicken, officials with the U.S. Agriculture Department said. No illnesses have been confirmed in connection with the recall, USDA officials said. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has not launched an outbreak investigation, a spokesperson said.

    The recall, issued on Oct. 9, includes foods produced between May 31 and Oct. 8. The USDA has posted a 342-page list of hundreds of potentially affected foods, including chicken wraps sold at Trader Joe’s, chicken burritos sold at Costco and many types of salads sold at stores such as Target and Walmart. The foods were also sent to school districts and restaurants across the country.

    The recalled foods can be identified by establishment numbers “51205 or P-51205” inside or under the USDA mark of inspection. Consumers can search on the USDA recall site to find potentially affected products. Such foods should be thrown away or returned to stores for refunds, officials said.

    Eating foods contaminated with listeria can cause potentially serious illness. About 1,600 people are infected with listeria bacteria each year in the U.S. and about 260 die, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

    Listeria infections typically cause fever, muscle aches and tiredness and may cause stiff neck, confusion, loss of balance and convulsions. Symptoms can occur quickly or to up to 10 weeks after eating contaminated food. The infections are especially dangerous for older people, those with weakened immune systems or who are pregnant.

    The same type of bacteria is responsible for an outbreak tied to Boar’s Head deli meat that has killed at least 10 people since May.

    ___

    The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • Food poisoning dangers are real after severe weather. Here’s how to protect yourself

    Food poisoning dangers are real after severe weather. Here’s how to protect yourself

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    Hurricanes and other natural disasters often create a cascade of unexpected complications, including extended power and water outages, flooding, mold damage and other emergencies. Now add the increased danger of food poisoning to that list.Related video above — Report: Only 1 in every 200 North Carolinians will be insured for Hurricane Helene damagesThere is the possibility for a rise in foodborne illnesses like salmonella and E. coli after natural disasters, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, when power outages affect cold storage.If your household has recently been hit by a power outage, here are ways to keep your food safe:Keep your fridge door shutUnder normal circumstances, your fridge should be kept at 40 degrees Fahrenheit or below and your freezer at 0 degrees Fahrenheit or below, according to the CDC. When the power goes out, it’s a race against time to make sure food doesn’t spoil.”Bacteria multiply quickly between temperatures of 40 degrees Fahrenheit and 140 degrees Fahrenheit,” CNN wellness expert Dr. Leana Wen told CNN. “Refrigerators can generally keep food cold if it’s been under four hours and the door was not opened.”To make sure you’re getting the right temperature, purchase a food thermometer, the CDC suggests.Freezers can buy you more timeFood stored in a freezer at 0 degrees Fahrenheit is safe to re-freeze or cook as long as it doesn’t rise above that crucial 40-degree mark, according to the CDC.Once the power is cut, a full freezer can hold a safe temperature for 48 hours with the door closed. But, if it’s half full, that time could be cut to 24 hours – again, only if the door remains closed. That’s why experts suggest keeping any fridge activity to a minimum.Some people may turn to throwing things in the freezer to buy more time. Bill Marler, a food safety attorney in Seattle, said there are some things to take into account.”If you do this, you’re essentially adding warmer food into a cold environment, just like if you put hot food in the refrigerator,” he told CNN. “It will raise the temperature of the whole freezer and lower the amount of time things can stay safe.”To know when all is lost, the CDC and other food experts abide by a simple saying: “When in doubt, throw it out.”Some foods carry different risksPre-packaged foods and ready-to-eat foods can be a particular problem when considering food safety.”Things like improperly stored deli meals, cold cuts, hot dogs and even some types of soft cheeses can be linked to listeria,” Marler said. “Vegetables and fruits can be a little easier because they tell you when they’re not good to eat. But with some pre-made foods, it can be harder to tell.”He advised people to avoid cross-contamination that could complicate a post-power outage fridge purge.”Don’t let the juice from hot dogs contaminate other foods, and store meats — even cooked meats — separately from fruits and vegetables and the like.”Keeping foods separate from each other is a practice that should start at the grocery store, according to the CDC. They should also be kept in separate areas of the refrigerator any day of the week, regardless of the weather.Cooked doesn’t mean safeWhile items like milk and raw meat are the first things to consider when purging a too-warm fridge, Wen said it’s important not to overlook cooked items.”Cooked food should not be left out at room temperature for more than two hours. Leftovers that cannot be kept at 40 degrees F or lower should be thrown out,” she said.The CDC also has a helpful chart of how long foods can stay fresh in a functioning fridge, whether opened or unopened.People with pre-existing conditions should be more carefulThe effects of foodborne illnesses can range from mild discomfort to life-threatening complications. People with pre-existing conditions can be more at risk for serious illness, the CDC said.”It varies by the type of contamination, but pregnant women, the very young and the very old, and people with compromised immune systems are more at risk for contracting serious diseases, like listeria, that can occur with improper food handling or storage,” Marler said.If you are in one of these high-risk groups, the CDC recommends paying special attention to food safety procedures when buying, preparing, cooking and storing your food.

    Hurricanes and other natural disasters often create a cascade of unexpected complications, including extended power and water outages, flooding, mold damage and other emergencies. Now add the increased danger of food poisoning to that list.

    Related video above — Report: Only 1 in every 200 North Carolinians will be insured for Hurricane Helene damages

    There is the possibility for a rise in foodborne illnesses like salmonella and E. coli after natural disasters, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, when power outages affect cold storage.

    If your household has recently been hit by a power outage, here are ways to keep your food safe:

    Keep your fridge door shut

    Under normal circumstances, your fridge should be kept at 40 degrees Fahrenheit or below and your freezer at 0 degrees Fahrenheit or below, according to the CDC. When the power goes out, it’s a race against time to make sure food doesn’t spoil.

    “Bacteria multiply quickly between temperatures of 40 degrees Fahrenheit and 140 degrees Fahrenheit,” CNN wellness expert Dr. Leana Wen told CNN. “Refrigerators can generally keep food cold if it’s been under four hours and the door was not opened.”

    To make sure you’re getting the right temperature, purchase a food thermometer, the CDC suggests.

    Freezers can buy you more time

    Food stored in a freezer at 0 degrees Fahrenheit is safe to re-freeze or cook as long as it doesn’t rise above that crucial 40-degree mark, according to the CDC.

    Once the power is cut, a full freezer can hold a safe temperature for 48 hours with the door closed. But, if it’s half full, that time could be cut to 24 hours – again, only if the door remains closed. That’s why experts suggest keeping any fridge activity to a minimum.

    Some people may turn to throwing things in the freezer to buy more time. Bill Marler, a food safety attorney in Seattle, said there are some things to take into account.

    “If you do this, you’re essentially adding warmer food into a cold environment, just like if you put hot food in the refrigerator,” he told CNN. “It will raise the temperature of the whole freezer and lower the amount of time things can stay safe.”

    To know when all is lost, the CDC and other food experts abide by a simple saying: “When in doubt, throw it out.”

    Some foods carry different risks

    Pre-packaged foods and ready-to-eat foods can be a particular problem when considering food safety.

    “Things like improperly stored deli meals, cold cuts, hot dogs and even some types of soft cheeses can be linked to listeria,” Marler said. “Vegetables and fruits can be a little easier because they tell you when they’re not good to eat. But with some pre-made foods, it can be harder to tell.”

    He advised people to avoid cross-contamination that could complicate a post-power outage fridge purge.

    “Don’t let the juice from hot dogs contaminate other foods, and store meats — even cooked meats — separately from fruits and vegetables and the like.”

    Keeping foods separate from each other is a practice that should start at the grocery store, according to the CDC. They should also be kept in separate areas of the refrigerator any day of the week, regardless of the weather.

    Cooked doesn’t mean safe

    While items like milk and raw meat are the first things to consider when purging a too-warm fridge, Wen said it’s important not to overlook cooked items.

    “Cooked food should not be left out at room temperature for more than two hours. Leftovers that cannot be kept at 40 degrees F or lower should be thrown out,” she said.

    The CDC also has a helpful chart of how long foods can stay fresh in a functioning fridge, whether opened or unopened.

    People with pre-existing conditions should be more careful

    The effects of foodborne illnesses can range from mild discomfort to life-threatening complications. People with pre-existing conditions can be more at risk for serious illness, the CDC said.

    “It varies by the type of contamination, but pregnant women, the very young and the very old, and people with compromised immune systems are more at risk for contracting serious diseases, like listeria, that can occur with improper food handling or storage,” Marler said.

    If you are in one of these high-risk groups, the CDC recommends paying special attention to food safety procedures when buying, preparing, cooking and storing your food.

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  • 2013 news report on human remains is unrelated to McDonald’s

    2013 news report on human remains is unrelated to McDonald’s

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    McDonald’s has been serving fries and burgers for more than 70 years. But a viral video put would-be customers on alert about what sounded like a frightening fast-food development.

    “FBI finds human remains at a McDonald’s meat supplier,” read text over several Instagram videos shared Sept. 27 and Sept. 29 that show a television news reporter appearing to break news about the FBI recovering evidence of human remains from a Detroit business.

    (Screenshot from Instagram)

    The posts were flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and Threads.)

    The video clip is real, but it does not show a reporter at a McDonald’s meat supplier. It’s from Dec. 13, 2013, and shows a reporter from metro Detroit’s ABC News affiliate WXYZ-TV discussing the FBI’s investigation into International Biological Inc., a business the reporter described as a “medical educational service provider.”

    Arthur Rathburn, who owned the business, was sentenced to nine years in prison for selling diseased body parts for use in medical and dental training.

    We found no mention of McDonald’s in news reports or court documents involving the case. 

    PolitiFact previously debunked claims that human remains were found in a McDonald’s meat factory. 

    So eat your Big Mac in peace. The claim that this video shows the “FBI finds human remains at a McDonald’s meat supplier” is Pants on Fire!

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  • Boar’s Head faces legal scrutiny over deadly deli meat listeria outbreak, USDA says

    Boar’s Head faces legal scrutiny over deadly deli meat listeria outbreak, USDA says

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    Boar’s Head, the deli meat company at the center of a deadly listeria food poisoning outbreak, is being scrutinized by law enforcement officials, the U.S. Agriculture Department disclosed in response to government records requests.

    Officials with USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service refused to share documents regarding the agency’s inspections and enforcement at the Boar’s Head plant in Jarratt, Virginia, plus inspection reports from eight other company factories across the U.S.

    The records — which FSIS acknowledged include dozens of pages of documentation — were withheld because they were compiled “for a law enforcement purpose, which includes both civil and criminal statutes,” according to a letter sent Friday in response to Freedom of Information Act requests submitted by The Associated Press. Releasing the records could “interfere with” and “hinder” the government’s investigation, the letter said.

    The AP asked for records regarding the listeria outbreak that, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has killed 10 people and sickened at least 50 in 19 states since May. Listeria bacteria were initially detected in samples of Boar’s Head liverwurst and later traced to illnesses in people.

    Image

    Previously released records revealed problems including mold, insects, dripping water and meat and fat residue on walls, floors and equipment dating back at least two years. Boar’s Head earlier recalled more than 7 million pounds of deli meat distributed to stores across the country. This month, the Sarasota, Florida-based company said it has closed the Virginia plant and permanently stopped making liverwurst.

    Boar’s Head is facing several lawsuits filed by victims and their families.

    FSIS officials did not respond to AP’s emails seeking additional comment about the records. Justice Department officials declined to comment on potential legal actions against Boar’s Head.

    This week, Sen. Richard Blumenthal and Rep. Rosa DeLauro called on the Agriculture and Justice departments to “work closely” to determine whether to bring criminal charges against Boar’s Head in connection with the crisis. In response, USDA’s own internal investigators are reviewing the agency’s work and will decide by the end of the year whether to open an inquiry, according to Blumenthal’s office.

    Past food poisoning outbreaks have resulted in criminal and civil penalties.

    In 2020, Chipotle agreed to pay a record $25 million to resolve criminal charges over tainted food that sickened more than 1,100 people in outbreaks between 2015 and 2018. In 2015, former Peanut Corporation of America executive Stewart Parnell was sentenced to 28 years in prison after an outbreak of salmonella in his company’s peanut butter killed nine people and sickened more than 700.

    ___

    The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • No evidence ramen noodles contain deadly bacteria

    No evidence ramen noodles contain deadly bacteria

    [ad_1]

    Ramen noodle lovers everywhere can slurp in peace. A social media claim that a deadly bacteria was found in the products is bogus.

    The claim appears to have been instantly generated using artificial intelligence. 

    “A deadly outbreak linked to ramen noodles has sparked global fear as multiple deaths have been reported,” a Sept. 17 Instagram video said through a talking fish. 

    The video also said children have gotten sick and died within hours and that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned that a third of infected adults may die. Experts traced it to “a dangerous bacteria named streptococcal,” the video said.

    This post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and Threads.)

    The Instagram account’s profile page links to a product called Headlines, which, for a fee, says subscribers can “experience the future of news with AI-driven personalized content texted directly to you.” It promises to send “fact-checked news texts based on your preferences.”

    It appears the fact-check of this Instagram post failed, however.

    (Instagram screenshot)

    The video shows screenshots of three online articles that describe five children from other countries dying after eating instant noodles. Two of the incidents happened in South Africa in 2021, and the third in Pakistan happened in May. 

    We found other social media users making similar claims, citing the five overseas deaths.

    None of the articles mentioned streptococcal bacteria. A 2022 news report said Grandisync, the noodle manufacturer, said the children in South Africa died from ingesting an insecticide, not the noodles. We contacted the National Consumer Commission in South Africa, which was investigating the company, but received no response.

    It’s unclear from other Pakistan news reports what caused the children’s deaths.

    Back in the U.S., the CDC website shows no press releases or active investigations about foodborne outbreaks in ramen noodles, or about streptococcal being found in them.

    Streptococcus is a contagious bacteria that can cause different types of infections, from minor ones such as strep throat to potentially deadly ones such as necrotizing fasciitis, a flesh-eating disease. Streptococcus is usually spread by respiratory droplets or direct contact, but rarely can be spread through improperly handled food, the CDC said.

    The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, meanwhile, in May announced the company Sun Noodle voluntarily recalled about 37,000 cases of a frozen noodle product it said contained undeclared egg white powder. In December, New India Bazar recalled Maggi 2 Minute Noodles because of undeclared peanuts.

    In 2019, a brand of veggie ramen was recalled because of hard-boiled eggs potentially contaminated with listeria.

    But there are no recent ramen noodle recalls. We searched the FDA’s recalls, market withdrawals and safety alerts website and found nothing about ramen noodle products being recalled because of a deadly bacteria.

    The claim that the CDC warned that people are at risk of death from a deadly bacteria found in ramen noodles is not backed by evidence. We rate it False.

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  • 13 foods you should never eat after they expire

    13 foods you should never eat after they expire

    [ad_1]

    – Hi, I am Rosemary Trout, a professor of food science, and we’re here today in the Dr. Delish offices to answer some of your food and kitchen science-related questions. (keys tapping) (light techno music) Let’s see what we got. (paper rustling) Ooh. “Can you eat sprouted garlic?” This is a really good and common question. So, in a perfect world, we always have fresh garlic on hands and never have to deal with any kind of pesky, sprouted garlic. But is it really a danger to our health? And what happens when we crack open a clove of garlic, and we see a sprout inside? (skin crackling) Sure, you can eat it. It’s perfectly safe, but it does have a little bit of a different flavor to it. So let’s talk a little bit about why. When garlic is younger and fresher, it’s packed with water and natural sugars like fructose. However, as it ages and starts to sprout, the sugar reserves are depleted, and it leaves the garlic tasting really sharp and intense. Honestly, with lightly-sprouted garlic, there really aren’t any negatives. It may be even better, because in some studies they show that older cloves tend to have higher amounts of antioxidants, so that’s a good thing. The actual sprout itself is gonna have a little bit of a grassy note to it. So you might want that, you might not. It’s really up to you. You can see there’s nothing wrong with this sprouted clove of garlic. It’s a little bit more intense in the clove, but if you’re cooking with it, you’re really not gonna notice any big difference there. It’s if you’re using it in raw applications, like, I don’t know, maybe making an aioli, you’re going to really feel that bite. So for raw applications, stick with the fresh garlic that doesn’t have any green shoots to it. If you really still wanna use garlic that hasn’t sprouted, the way that you store it can make a big difference. So you’re gonna wanna look for a dark, cool, slightly humid place to store your garlic, and it will minimize or prolong the sprouting process. So to wrap this up, it’s 100% safe to eat, but the taste profile, of course, that’s your decision. Thanks for watching. If you have any questions or comments, please be sure to leave them down below, and I’ll see you next time in the Dr. Delish offices. Bye. (light techno music)

    13 foods you should never eat after they expire, according to food safety experts

    Here’s what experts have to say.

    Deciphering the “use by” dates on food products is a lot less straightforward than just checking the calendar. Your Greek yogurt is a couple days past its expiration date, but still passes the sniff test. Should you really toss the entire carton? In this economy? After all, groceries are 10% more expensive than they were last year and about 30 to 40% of the U.S. food chain goes to waste.“Generally speaking, expiration dates in the U.S. don’t mean a lot,” says Laurie Beyranevand, the director of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems at Vermont Law School. “What’s even more confusing is that they’re written in a few different ways on a product label.” You might see some labels that use a “best before” date while others go with a “sell by” date. Typically, the labels signal the date that manufacturers think the quality of the food may no longer be at its peak, but they don’t usually address a product’s safety, Beyranevand says. The expiration dates on food items are often conservative, too, says food safety attorney Jory Lange. As a result, we end up throwing away a lot of safe food out of fear that it’s rotten.As long as you’re storing your groceries properly, you can still eat or use most foods after their expiration dates, says Janilyn Hutchings, a Certified Professional in Food Safety (CP-FS) who works for StateFoodSafety as a food scientist. “Better indicators for whether food has gone bad are ‘off’ smells, textures, and flavors,” she says.That being said, certain foods are at a higher risk for degrading in quality or carrying harmful pathogens that can make you sick. You don’t need to strictly follow every “best by” date, but here are 13 foods that you definitely shouldn’t eat once they expire, according to experts.Infant FormulaFederal law doesn’t require food manufacturers to provide expiration dates, except when it comes to infant formula, says Hutchings. After the expiration date, the amount of nutrients in the formula may start to decrease, she says, which is problematic because the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) requires that the quantity of nutrients in the formula matches what’s listed on the label. The concern here has less to do with food safety, and more with making sure infants aren’t facing nutrient deficiencies.MeatsWhile ground beef, steak, and chicken can still be safe to eat after the use-by date, be extra cautious and look for signs of spoilage like odor, discoloring, and mold, Hutchings says.You can also test some meat, like chicken, with the fingerprint test. “If you press down on the chicken and it bounces back, it’s still good,” Hutchings says. “If the imprint of your finger stays, it’s likely not good and should be thrown away.”Eggs Eggs have become super expensive, so tossing even one feels wasteful. While eggs might be safe to eat after their use-by date, you should be extra careful, Hutchings says. To eliminate the guesswork, she recommends giving eggs the float test. Take a large cup or bowl and fill it with water. Drop the egg in to see if it sinks, stands up, or floats. “As eggs age, the air cell in the egg gets bigger,” Hutchings says. “If they sink, they are fresh and fine to eat. If they stand up, they are older but still okay to eat. If the egg floats, it is likely old.”A spoiled egg will also have an odor when you crack it open, according to FSIS. Eggs can carry salmonella, a bacteria that can make you sick. Your best bet is to store eggs in their original carton and eat them within three weeks, according to the Food and Drug Administration. Soft CheesesIf you spot mold on a block of cheddar, you can usually cut it off and enjoy the rest of your cheese. But cream cheese, ricotta, and cottage cheese are a different story. When mold gets on soft cheeses (and crumbled ones, too) its threads can permeate the cheese, so the contamination goes beyond what you can see with your naked eye. Harmful bacteria like listeria, brucella, salmonella and E. coli can grow with the mold, according to the Mayo Clinic.Deli Meat Moisture combined with a lack of salt speeds up spoilage in foods like deli meats while dry foods such as rice and pasta enjoy longer shelf lives, says Lange.“We wouldn’t recommend eating high-moisture, low-salt items past their expiration dates because of bacteria growth that can lead to food poisoning,” he says. If your cold cuts smell sour or look slimy, it’s time to toss them. FiddleheadsYou’re probably not frequently cooking with fiddleheads, an asparagus-like springtime delicacy. But something to keep in mind if you do plan to whip up a side dish with these green tightly coiled, Dr. Seuss-like ferns: They can emit toxins that make you sick if you eat them past their expiration dates, Lange says. StrawberriesOne of the biggest bummers of summer is opening your fridge to find that your strawberries are wearing a furry white coat. Since mold spores are airborne, there’s a good chance your entire package of strawberries is contaminated and should be tossed, according to the Cleveland Clinic. After all, some molds can make you sick or cause allergic reactions, so it’s best to err on the side of safety on this one. If you start to notice your fruit is reaching its expiration date, pop it in the freezer to extend the shelf life and use the berries later on in smoothies or cooked desserts, says Norah Clark, a professional chef. Ground Spices While it’s not a food-safety concern, using spices past their prime can mean your meals aren’t as flavorful as they should be, Clark says.“Some spices that lose flavor after expiration include ground cinnamon, paprika, and ground cumin,” she says. Clark recommends storing your spices in airtight containers away from heat and direct sunlight to keep them in their most flavorful state.Restaurant LeftoversSure, there’s no stamped expiration date on the container you take home from a restaurant. But, if you go out to eat over the weekend and pack your restaurant leftovers for a mid-week lunch, you could make yourself sick.Since restaurant leftovers are at room temperature for a period of time while you drive back home, bacteria can grow on it and multiply, says dietitian Hannah Byrne, MS, RDN. “While refrigeration can slow down the bacterial growth, it doesn’t stop it completely,” she says. “Plus, some restaurant leftovers have a variety of different food groups in them and they all have different expiration dates on them, so for safety it’s best to consume them within three to four days.” The taste and texture also changes with leftovers, Byrne says, as they tend to become dry and lose their flavors. Raw FishIf you pick up raw fish from your local store, you should first make sure it’s being stored on a bed of ice that’s not melting. If it’s dry or mushy, it’s probably old, and not safe to eat. Once you get it home, seafood should be stored in your fridge for just one or two days before you cook it or move it to the freezer, according to U.S. Food and Drug guidelines. If seafood spoils, you’ll smell sour, fishy, or ammonia odors, which become stronger after cooking, and food safety officials recommend tossing the food.Leafy Greens You may have had great intentions when you bought that big bag of spinach. But if it’s taking you longer than expected to plow through the greens, keep a close eye on the expiration date. Green leafy vegetables like spinach and kale will have a bitter taste after they expire, says Byrne, and making a salad with the expired greens puts you at risk of developing a foodborne illness. If your greens are nearing expiration, use some up in a green smoothie recipe. Nuts Because nuts are so high in unsaturated fats, they tend to go rancid quickly, says dietitian Kelsey Kunik, RDN and nutrition advisor for Zenmaster Wellness. Most nuts, she says, will last around four to six months at room temperature when stored in an airtight container in a dark place. “But when the oils oxidize, the nut produces a bitter or sour taste, letting you know it’s gone rancid,” Kunik says. “While it’s safe to eat nuts that have gone bad in small amounts, you won’t want to because of the bad taste.”Cooking Oils The shelf life of cooking oil is typically a year if it’s sitting on the shelf unopened. It’s approximately six months once it’s open, says dietitian Tracee Yablon-Brenner, R.D., with Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck, New Jersey. She recommends storing cooking oils in dark glass away from light and heat. If it tastes bitter, it’s rancid and should be thrown away, Yablon-Brenner says. Also, unprocessed oils like extra virgin olive oil lose their beneficial polyphenols as they age, Kunik says, and the flavor can become altered as well.

    Deciphering the “use by” dates on food products is a lot less straightforward than just checking the calendar. Your Greek yogurt is a couple days past its expiration date, but still passes the sniff test. Should you really toss the entire carton? In this economy? After all, groceries are 10% more expensive than they were last year and about 30 to 40% of the U.S. food chain goes to waste.

    “Generally speaking, expiration dates in the U.S. don’t mean a lot,” says Laurie Beyranevand, the director of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems at Vermont Law School. “What’s even more confusing is that they’re written in a few different ways on a product label.”

    You might see some labels that use a “best before” date while others go with a “sell by” date. Typically, the labels signal the date that manufacturers think the quality of the food may no longer be at its peak, but they don’t usually address a product’s safety, Beyranevand says. The expiration dates on food items are often conservative, too, says food safety attorney Jory Lange. As a result, we end up throwing away a lot of safe food out of fear that it’s rotten.

    As long as you’re storing your groceries properly, you can still eat or use most foods after their expiration dates, says Janilyn Hutchings, a Certified Professional in Food Safety (CP-FS) who works for StateFoodSafety as a food scientist. “Better indicators for whether food has gone bad are ‘off’ smells, textures, and flavors,” she says.

    That being said, certain foods are at a higher risk for degrading in quality or carrying harmful pathogens that can make you sick. You don’t need to strictly follow every “best by” date, but here are 13 foods that you definitely shouldn’t eat once they expire, according to experts.

    Infant Formula

    Federal law doesn’t require food manufacturers to provide expiration dates, except when it comes to infant formula, says Hutchings. After the expiration date, the amount of nutrients in the formula may start to decrease, she says, which is problematic because the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) requires that the quantity of nutrients in the formula matches what’s listed on the label. The concern here has less to do with food safety, and more with making sure infants aren’t facing nutrient deficiencies.

    Meats

    While ground beef, steak, and chicken can still be safe to eat after the use-by date, be extra cautious and look for signs of spoilage like odor, discoloring, and mold, Hutchings says.

    You can also test some meat, like chicken, with the fingerprint test.

    “If you press down on the chicken and it bounces back, it’s still good,” Hutchings says. “If the imprint of your finger stays, it’s likely not good and should be thrown away.”

    Eggs

    Eggs have become super expensive, so tossing even one feels wasteful. While eggs might be safe to eat after their use-by date, you should be extra careful, Hutchings says.

    To eliminate the guesswork, she recommends giving eggs the float test. Take a large cup or bowl and fill it with water. Drop the egg in to see if it sinks, stands up, or floats.

    “As eggs age, the air cell in the egg gets bigger,” Hutchings says. “If they sink, they are fresh and fine to eat. If they stand up, they are older but still okay to eat. If the egg floats, it is likely old.”

    A spoiled egg will also have an odor when you crack it open, according to FSIS. Eggs can carry salmonella, a bacteria that can make you sick. Your best bet is to store eggs in their original carton and eat them within three weeks, according to the Food and Drug Administration.

    Soft Cheeses

    If you spot mold on a block of cheddar, you can usually cut it off and enjoy the rest of your cheese. But cream cheese, ricotta, and cottage cheese are a different story. When mold gets on soft cheeses (and crumbled ones, too) its threads can permeate the cheese, so the contamination goes beyond what you can see with your naked eye. Harmful bacteria like listeria, brucella, salmonella and E. coli can grow with the mold, according to the Mayo Clinic.

    Deli Meat

    Moisture combined with a lack of salt speeds up spoilage in foods like deli meats while dry foods such as rice and pasta enjoy longer shelf lives, says Lange.

    “We wouldn’t recommend eating high-moisture, low-salt items past their expiration dates because of bacteria growth that can lead to food poisoning,” he says.

    If your cold cuts smell sour or look slimy, it’s time to toss them.

    Fiddleheads

    You’re probably not frequently cooking with fiddleheads, an asparagus-like springtime delicacy. But something to keep in mind if you do plan to whip up a side dish with these green tightly coiled, Dr. Seuss-like ferns: They can emit toxins that make you sick if you eat them past their expiration dates, Lange says.

    Strawberries

    One of the biggest bummers of summer is opening your fridge to find that your strawberries are wearing a furry white coat. Since mold spores are airborne, there’s a good chance your entire package of strawberries is contaminated and should be tossed, according to the Cleveland Clinic. After all, some molds can make you sick or cause allergic reactions, so it’s best to err on the side of safety on this one. If you start to notice your fruit is reaching its expiration date, pop it in the freezer to extend the shelf life and use the berries later on in smoothies or cooked desserts, says Norah Clark, a professional chef.

    Ground Spices

    While it’s not a food-safety concern, using spices past their prime can mean your meals aren’t as flavorful as they should be, Clark says.

    “Some spices that lose flavor after expiration include ground cinnamon, paprika, and ground cumin,” she says.

    Clark recommends storing your spices in airtight containers away from heat and direct sunlight to keep them in their most flavorful state.

    Restaurant Leftovers

    Sure, there’s no stamped expiration date on the container you take home from a restaurant. But, if you go out to eat over the weekend and pack your restaurant leftovers for a mid-week lunch, you could make yourself sick.

    Since restaurant leftovers are at room temperature for a period of time while you drive back home, bacteria can grow on it and multiply, says dietitian Hannah Byrne, MS, RDN.

    “While refrigeration can slow down the bacterial growth, it doesn’t stop it completely,” she says. “Plus, some restaurant leftovers have a variety of different food groups in them and they all have different expiration dates on them, so for safety it’s best to consume them within three to four days.”

    The taste and texture also changes with leftovers, Byrne says, as they tend to become dry and lose their flavors.

    Raw Fish

    If you pick up raw fish from your local store, you should first make sure it’s being stored on a bed of ice that’s not melting. If it’s dry or mushy, it’s probably old, and not safe to eat. Once you get it home, seafood should be stored in your fridge for just one or two days before you cook it or move it to the freezer, according to U.S. Food and Drug guidelines. If seafood spoils, you’ll smell sour, fishy, or ammonia odors, which become stronger after cooking, and food safety officials recommend tossing the food.

    Leafy Greens

    You may have had great intentions when you bought that big bag of spinach. But if it’s taking you longer than expected to plow through the greens, keep a close eye on the expiration date. Green leafy vegetables like spinach and kale will have a bitter taste after they expire, says Byrne, and making a salad with the expired greens puts you at risk of developing a foodborne illness. If your greens are nearing expiration, use some up in a green smoothie recipe.

    Nuts

    Because nuts are so high in unsaturated fats, they tend to go rancid quickly, says dietitian Kelsey Kunik, RDN and nutrition advisor for Zenmaster Wellness. Most nuts, she says, will last around four to six months at room temperature when stored in an airtight container in a dark place.

    “But when the oils oxidize, the nut produces a bitter or sour taste, letting you know it’s gone rancid,” Kunik says. “While it’s safe to eat nuts that have gone bad in small amounts, you won’t want to because of the bad taste.”

    Cooking Oils

    The shelf life of cooking oil is typically a year if it’s sitting on the shelf unopened. It’s approximately six months once it’s open, says dietitian Tracee Yablon-Brenner, R.D., with Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck, New Jersey. She recommends storing cooking oils in dark glass away from light and heat. If it tastes bitter, it’s rancid and should be thrown away, Yablon-Brenner says.

    Also, unprocessed oils like extra virgin olive oil lose their beneficial polyphenols as they age, Kunik says, and the flavor can become altered as well.

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  • 13 foods you should never eat after they expire

    13 foods you should never eat after they expire

    [ad_1]

    – Hi, I am Rosemary Trout, a professor of food science, and we’re here today in the Dr. Delish offices to answer some of your food and kitchen science-related questions. (keys tapping) (light techno music) Let’s see what we got. (paper rustling) Ooh. “Can you eat sprouted garlic?” This is a really good and common question. So, in a perfect world, we always have fresh garlic on hands and never have to deal with any kind of pesky, sprouted garlic. But is it really a danger to our health? And what happens when we crack open a clove of garlic, and we see a sprout inside? (skin crackling) Sure, you can eat it. It’s perfectly safe, but it does have a little bit of a different flavor to it. So let’s talk a little bit about why. When garlic is younger and fresher, it’s packed with water and natural sugars like fructose. However, as it ages and starts to sprout, the sugar reserves are depleted, and it leaves the garlic tasting really sharp and intense. Honestly, with lightly-sprouted garlic, there really aren’t any negatives. It may be even better, because in some studies they show that older cloves tend to have higher amounts of antioxidants, so that’s a good thing. The actual sprout itself is gonna have a little bit of a grassy note to it. So you might want that, you might not. It’s really up to you. You can see there’s nothing wrong with this sprouted clove of garlic. It’s a little bit more intense in the clove, but if you’re cooking with it, you’re really not gonna notice any big difference there. It’s if you’re using it in raw applications, like, I don’t know, maybe making an aioli, you’re going to really feel that bite. So for raw applications, stick with the fresh garlic that doesn’t have any green shoots to it. If you really still wanna use garlic that hasn’t sprouted, the way that you store it can make a big difference. So you’re gonna wanna look for a dark, cool, slightly humid place to store your garlic, and it will minimize or prolong the sprouting process. So to wrap this up, it’s 100% safe to eat, but the taste profile, of course, that’s your decision. Thanks for watching. If you have any questions or comments, please be sure to leave them down below, and I’ll see you next time in the Dr. Delish offices. Bye. (light techno music)

    13 foods you should never eat after they expire, according to food safety experts

    Here’s what experts have to say.

    Deciphering the “use by” dates on food products is a lot less straightforward than just checking the calendar. Your Greek yogurt is a couple days past its expiration date, but still passes the sniff test. Should you really toss the entire carton? In this economy? After all, groceries are 10% more expensive than they were last year and about 30 to 40% of the U.S. food chain goes to waste.“Generally speaking, expiration dates in the U.S. don’t mean a lot,” says Laurie Beyranevand, the director of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems at Vermont Law School. “What’s even more confusing is that they’re written in a few different ways on a product label.” You might see some labels that use a “best before” date while others go with a “sell by” date. Typically, the labels signal the date that manufacturers think the quality of the food may no longer be at its peak, but they don’t usually address a product’s safety, Beyranevand says. The expiration dates on food items are often conservative, too, says food safety attorney Jory Lange. As a result, we end up throwing away a lot of safe food out of fear that it’s rotten.As long as you’re storing your groceries properly, you can still eat or use most foods after their expiration dates, says Janilyn Hutchings, a Certified Professional in Food Safety (CP-FS) who works for StateFoodSafety as a food scientist. “Better indicators for whether food has gone bad are ‘off’ smells, textures, and flavors,” she says.That being said, certain foods are at a higher risk for degrading in quality or carrying harmful pathogens that can make you sick. You don’t need to strictly follow every “best by” date, but here are 13 foods that you definitely shouldn’t eat once they expire, according to experts.Infant FormulaFederal law doesn’t require food manufacturers to provide expiration dates, except when it comes to infant formula, says Hutchings. After the expiration date, the amount of nutrients in the formula may start to decrease, she says, which is problematic because the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) requires that the quantity of nutrients in the formula matches what’s listed on the label. The concern here has less to do with food safety, and more with making sure infants aren’t facing nutrient deficiencies.MeatsWhile ground beef, steak, and chicken can still be safe to eat after the use-by date, be extra cautious and look for signs of spoilage like odor, discoloring, and mold, Hutchings says.You can also test some meat, like chicken, with the fingerprint test. “If you press down on the chicken and it bounces back, it’s still good,” Hutchings says. “If the imprint of your finger stays, it’s likely not good and should be thrown away.”Eggs Eggs have become super expensive, so tossing even one feels wasteful. While eggs might be safe to eat after their use-by date, you should be extra careful, Hutchings says. To eliminate the guesswork, she recommends giving eggs the float test. Take a large cup or bowl and fill it with water. Drop the egg in to see if it sinks, stands up, or floats. “As eggs age, the air cell in the egg gets bigger,” Hutchings says. “If they sink, they are fresh and fine to eat. If they stand up, they are older but still okay to eat. If the egg floats, it is likely old.”A spoiled egg will also have an odor when you crack it open, according to FSIS. Eggs can carry salmonella, a bacteria that can make you sick. Your best bet is to store eggs in their original carton and eat them within three weeks, according to the Food and Drug Administration. Soft CheesesIf you spot mold on a block of cheddar, you can usually cut it off and enjoy the rest of your cheese. But cream cheese, ricotta, and cottage cheese are a different story. When mold gets on soft cheeses (and crumbled ones, too) its threads can permeate the cheese, so the contamination goes beyond what you can see with your naked eye. Harmful bacteria like listeria, brucella, salmonella and E. coli can grow with the mold, according to the Mayo Clinic.Deli Meat Moisture combined with a lack of salt speeds up spoilage in foods like deli meats while dry foods such as rice and pasta enjoy longer shelf lives, says Lange.“We wouldn’t recommend eating high-moisture, low-salt items past their expiration dates because of bacteria growth that can lead to food poisoning,” he says. If your cold cuts smell sour or look slimy, it’s time to toss them. FiddleheadsYou’re probably not frequently cooking with fiddleheads, an asparagus-like springtime delicacy. But something to keep in mind if you do plan to whip up a side dish with these green tightly coiled, Dr. Seuss-like ferns: They can emit toxins that make you sick if you eat them past their expiration dates, Lange says. StrawberriesOne of the biggest bummers of summer is opening your fridge to find that your strawberries are wearing a furry white coat. Since mold spores are airborne, there’s a good chance your entire package of strawberries is contaminated and should be tossed, according to the Cleveland Clinic. After all, some molds can make you sick or cause allergic reactions, so it’s best to err on the side of safety on this one. If you start to notice your fruit is reaching its expiration date, pop it in the freezer to extend the shelf life and use the berries later on in smoothies or cooked desserts, says Norah Clark, a professional chef. Ground Spices While it’s not a food-safety concern, using spices past their prime can mean your meals aren’t as flavorful as they should be, Clark says.“Some spices that lose flavor after expiration include ground cinnamon, paprika, and ground cumin,” she says. Clark recommends storing your spices in airtight containers away from heat and direct sunlight to keep them in their most flavorful state.Restaurant LeftoversSure, there’s no stamped expiration date on the container you take home from a restaurant. But, if you go out to eat over the weekend and pack your restaurant leftovers for a mid-week lunch, you could make yourself sick.Since restaurant leftovers are at room temperature for a period of time while you drive back home, bacteria can grow on it and multiply, says dietitian Hannah Byrne, MS, RDN. “While refrigeration can slow down the bacterial growth, it doesn’t stop it completely,” she says. “Plus, some restaurant leftovers have a variety of different food groups in them and they all have different expiration dates on them, so for safety it’s best to consume them within three to four days.” The taste and texture also changes with leftovers, Byrne says, as they tend to become dry and lose their flavors. Raw FishIf you pick up raw fish from your local store, you should first make sure it’s being stored on a bed of ice that’s not melting. If it’s dry or mushy, it’s probably old, and not safe to eat. Once you get it home, seafood should be stored in your fridge for just one or two days before you cook it or move it to the freezer, according to U.S. Food and Drug guidelines. If seafood spoils, you’ll smell sour, fishy, or ammonia odors, which become stronger after cooking, and food safety officials recommend tossing the food.Leafy Greens You may have had great intentions when you bought that big bag of spinach. But if it’s taking you longer than expected to plow through the greens, keep a close eye on the expiration date. Green leafy vegetables like spinach and kale will have a bitter taste after they expire, says Byrne, and making a salad with the expired greens puts you at risk of developing a foodborne illness. If your greens are nearing expiration, use some up in a green smoothie recipe. Nuts Because nuts are so high in unsaturated fats, they tend to go rancid quickly, says dietitian Kelsey Kunik, RDN and nutrition advisor for Zenmaster Wellness. Most nuts, she says, will last around four to six months at room temperature when stored in an airtight container in a dark place. “But when the oils oxidize, the nut produces a bitter or sour taste, letting you know it’s gone rancid,” Kunik says. “While it’s safe to eat nuts that have gone bad in small amounts, you won’t want to because of the bad taste.”Cooking Oils The shelf life of cooking oil is typically a year if it’s sitting on the shelf unopened. It’s approximately six months once it’s open, says dietitian Tracee Yablon-Brenner, R.D., with Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck, New Jersey. She recommends storing cooking oils in dark glass away from light and heat. If it tastes bitter, it’s rancid and should be thrown away, Yablon-Brenner says. Also, unprocessed oils like extra virgin olive oil lose their beneficial polyphenols as they age, Kunik says, and the flavor can become altered as well.

    Deciphering the “use by” dates on food products is a lot less straightforward than just checking the calendar. Your Greek yogurt is a couple days past its expiration date, but still passes the sniff test. Should you really toss the entire carton? In this economy? After all, groceries are 10% more expensive than they were last year and about 30 to 40% of the U.S. food chain goes to waste.

    “Generally speaking, expiration dates in the U.S. don’t mean a lot,” says Laurie Beyranevand, the director of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems at Vermont Law School. “What’s even more confusing is that they’re written in a few different ways on a product label.”

    You might see some labels that use a “best before” date while others go with a “sell by” date. Typically, the labels signal the date that manufacturers think the quality of the food may no longer be at its peak, but they don’t usually address a product’s safety, Beyranevand says. The expiration dates on food items are often conservative, too, says food safety attorney Jory Lange. As a result, we end up throwing away a lot of safe food out of fear that it’s rotten.

    As long as you’re storing your groceries properly, you can still eat or use most foods after their expiration dates, says Janilyn Hutchings, a Certified Professional in Food Safety (CP-FS) who works for StateFoodSafety as a food scientist. “Better indicators for whether food has gone bad are ‘off’ smells, textures, and flavors,” she says.

    That being said, certain foods are at a higher risk for degrading in quality or carrying harmful pathogens that can make you sick. You don’t need to strictly follow every “best by” date, but here are 13 foods that you definitely shouldn’t eat once they expire, according to experts.

    Infant Formula

    Federal law doesn’t require food manufacturers to provide expiration dates, except when it comes to infant formula, says Hutchings. After the expiration date, the amount of nutrients in the formula may start to decrease, she says, which is problematic because the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) requires that the quantity of nutrients in the formula matches what’s listed on the label. The concern here has less to do with food safety, and more with making sure infants aren’t facing nutrient deficiencies.

    Meats

    While ground beef, steak, and chicken can still be safe to eat after the use-by date, be extra cautious and look for signs of spoilage like odor, discoloring, and mold, Hutchings says.

    You can also test some meat, like chicken, with the fingerprint test.

    “If you press down on the chicken and it bounces back, it’s still good,” Hutchings says. “If the imprint of your finger stays, it’s likely not good and should be thrown away.”

    Eggs

    Eggs have become super expensive, so tossing even one feels wasteful. While eggs might be safe to eat after their use-by date, you should be extra careful, Hutchings says.

    To eliminate the guesswork, she recommends giving eggs the float test. Take a large cup or bowl and fill it with water. Drop the egg in to see if it sinks, stands up, or floats.

    “As eggs age, the air cell in the egg gets bigger,” Hutchings says. “If they sink, they are fresh and fine to eat. If they stand up, they are older but still okay to eat. If the egg floats, it is likely old.”

    A spoiled egg will also have an odor when you crack it open, according to FSIS. Eggs can carry salmonella, a bacteria that can make you sick. Your best bet is to store eggs in their original carton and eat them within three weeks, according to the Food and Drug Administration.

    Soft Cheeses

    If you spot mold on a block of cheddar, you can usually cut it off and enjoy the rest of your cheese. But cream cheese, ricotta, and cottage cheese are a different story. When mold gets on soft cheeses (and crumbled ones, too) its threads can permeate the cheese, so the contamination goes beyond what you can see with your naked eye. Harmful bacteria like listeria, brucella, salmonella and E. coli can grow with the mold, according to the Mayo Clinic.

    Deli Meat

    Moisture combined with a lack of salt speeds up spoilage in foods like deli meats while dry foods such as rice and pasta enjoy longer shelf lives, says Lange.

    “We wouldn’t recommend eating high-moisture, low-salt items past their expiration dates because of bacteria growth that can lead to food poisoning,” he says.

    If your cold cuts smell sour or look slimy, it’s time to toss them.

    Fiddleheads

    You’re probably not frequently cooking with fiddleheads, an asparagus-like springtime delicacy. But something to keep in mind if you do plan to whip up a side dish with these green tightly coiled, Dr. Seuss-like ferns: They can emit toxins that make you sick if you eat them past their expiration dates, Lange says.

    Strawberries

    One of the biggest bummers of summer is opening your fridge to find that your strawberries are wearing a furry white coat. Since mold spores are airborne, there’s a good chance your entire package of strawberries is contaminated and should be tossed, according to the Cleveland Clinic. After all, some molds can make you sick or cause allergic reactions, so it’s best to err on the side of safety on this one. If you start to notice your fruit is reaching its expiration date, pop it in the freezer to extend the shelf life and use the berries later on in smoothies or cooked desserts, says Norah Clark, a professional chef.

    Ground Spices

    While it’s not a food-safety concern, using spices past their prime can mean your meals aren’t as flavorful as they should be, Clark says.

    “Some spices that lose flavor after expiration include ground cinnamon, paprika, and ground cumin,” she says.

    Clark recommends storing your spices in airtight containers away from heat and direct sunlight to keep them in their most flavorful state.

    Restaurant Leftovers

    Sure, there’s no stamped expiration date on the container you take home from a restaurant. But, if you go out to eat over the weekend and pack your restaurant leftovers for a mid-week lunch, you could make yourself sick.

    Since restaurant leftovers are at room temperature for a period of time while you drive back home, bacteria can grow on it and multiply, says dietitian Hannah Byrne, MS, RDN.

    “While refrigeration can slow down the bacterial growth, it doesn’t stop it completely,” she says. “Plus, some restaurant leftovers have a variety of different food groups in them and they all have different expiration dates on them, so for safety it’s best to consume them within three to four days.”

    The taste and texture also changes with leftovers, Byrne says, as they tend to become dry and lose their flavors.

    Raw Fish

    If you pick up raw fish from your local store, you should first make sure it’s being stored on a bed of ice that’s not melting. If it’s dry or mushy, it’s probably old, and not safe to eat. Once you get it home, seafood should be stored in your fridge for just one or two days before you cook it or move it to the freezer, according to U.S. Food and Drug guidelines. If seafood spoils, you’ll smell sour, fishy, or ammonia odors, which become stronger after cooking, and food safety officials recommend tossing the food.

    Leafy Greens

    You may have had great intentions when you bought that big bag of spinach. But if it’s taking you longer than expected to plow through the greens, keep a close eye on the expiration date. Green leafy vegetables like spinach and kale will have a bitter taste after they expire, says Byrne, and making a salad with the expired greens puts you at risk of developing a foodborne illness. If your greens are nearing expiration, use some up in a green smoothie recipe.

    Nuts

    Because nuts are so high in unsaturated fats, they tend to go rancid quickly, says dietitian Kelsey Kunik, RDN and nutrition advisor for Zenmaster Wellness. Most nuts, she says, will last around four to six months at room temperature when stored in an airtight container in a dark place.

    “But when the oils oxidize, the nut produces a bitter or sour taste, letting you know it’s gone rancid,” Kunik says. “While it’s safe to eat nuts that have gone bad in small amounts, you won’t want to because of the bad taste.”

    Cooking Oils

    The shelf life of cooking oil is typically a year if it’s sitting on the shelf unopened. It’s approximately six months once it’s open, says dietitian Tracee Yablon-Brenner, R.D., with Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck, New Jersey. She recommends storing cooking oils in dark glass away from light and heat. If it tastes bitter, it’s rancid and should be thrown away, Yablon-Brenner says.

    Also, unprocessed oils like extra virgin olive oil lose their beneficial polyphenols as they age, Kunik says, and the flavor can become altered as well.

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  • Ultraprocessed foods are everywhere. How bad are they?

    Ultraprocessed foods are everywhere. How bad are they?

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    Whether they know it or not, most Americans don’t go a day — or often a single meal — without eating ultraprocessed foods.

    From sugary cereals at breakfast to frozen pizzas at dinner, plus in-between snacks of potato chips, sodas and ice cream, ultraprocessed foods make up about 60% of the U.S. diet. For kids and teens, it’s even higher – about two-thirds of what they eat.

    That’s concerning because ultraprocessed foods have been linked to a host of negative health effects, from obesity and diabetes to heart disease, depression, dementia and more. One recent study suggested that eating these foods may raise the risk of early death.

    Nutrition science is tricky, though, and most research so far has found connections, not proof, regarding the health consequences of these foods.

    Food manufacturers argue that processing boosts food safety and supplies and offers a cheap, convenient way to provide a diverse and nutritious diet.

    Even if the science were clear, it’s hard to know what practical advice to give when ultraprocessed foods account for what one study estimates is 73% of the U.S. food supply.

    The Associated Press asked several nutrition experts and here’s what they said:

    What are ultraprocessed foods?

    Most foods are processed, whether it’s by freezing, grinding, fermentation, pasteurization or other means. In 2009, Brazilian epidemiologist Carlos Monteiro and colleagues first proposed a system that classifies foods according to the amount of processing they undergo, not by nutrient content.

    This article is part of AP’s Be Well coverage, focusing on wellness, fitness, diet and mental health. Read more Be Well.

    At the top of the four-tier scale are foods created through industrial processes and with ingredients such as additives, colors and preservatives that you couldn’t duplicate in a home kitchen, said Kevin Hall, a researcher who focuses on metabolism and diet at the National Institutes of Health.

    “These are most, but not all, of the packaged foods you see,” Hall said.

    Such foods are often made to be both cheap and irresistibly delicious, said Dr. Neena Prasad, director of the Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Food Policy Program.

    “They have just the right combination of sugar, salt and fat and you just can’t stop eating them,” Prasad said

    However, the level of processing alone doesn’t determine whether a food is unhealthy or not, Hall noted. Whole-grain bread, yogurt, tofu and infant formula are all highly processed, for instance, but they’re also nutritious.

    Are ultraprocessed foods harmful?

    Here’s the tricky part. Many studies suggest that diets high in such foods are linked to negative health outcomes. But these kinds of studies can’t say whether the foods are the cause of the negative effects — or whether there’s something else about the people who eat these foods that might be responsible.

    At the same time, ultraprocessed foods, as a group, tend to have higher amounts of sodium, saturated fat and sugar, and tend to be lower in fiber and protein. It’s not clear whether it’s just these nutrients that are driving the effects.

    Hall and his colleagues were the first to conduct a small but influential experiment that directly compared the results of eating similar diets made of ultraprocessed versus unprocessed foods.

    Published in 2019, the research included 20 adults who went to live at an NIH center for a month. They received diets of ultraprocessed and unprocessed foods matched for calories, sugar, fat, fiber and macronutrients for two weeks each and were told to eat as much as they liked.

    When participants ate the diet of ultraprocessed foods, they consumed about 500 calories per day more than when they ate unprocessed foods, researchers found — and they gained an average of about 2 pounds (1 kilogram) during the study period. When they ate only unprocessed foods for the same amount of time, they lost about 2 pounds (1 kilogram).

    Hall is conducting a more detailed study now, but the process is slow and costly and results aren’t expected until late next year. He and others argue that such definitive research is needed to determine exactly how ultraprocessed foods affect consumption.

    “It’s better to understand the mechanisms by which they drive the deleterious health consequences, if they’re driving them,” he said.

    Should ultraprocessed foods be regulated?

    Some advocates, like Prasad, argue that the large body of research linking ultraprocessed foods to poor health should be more than enough to spur government and industry to change policies. She calls for actions such as increased taxes on sugary drinks, stricter sodium restrictions for manufacturers and cracking down on marketing of such foods to children, the same way tobacco marketing is curtailed.

    “Do we want to risk our kids getting sicker while we wait for this perfect evidence to emerge?” Prasad said. Earlier this year, FDA Commissioner Robert Califf broached the subject, telling a conference of food policy experts that ultraprocessed foods are “one of the most complex things I’ve ever dealt with.”

    But, he concluded, “We’ve got to have the scientific basis and then we’ve got to follow through.”

    How should consumers manage ultraprocessed foods at home?

    In countries like the U.S., it’s hard to avoid highly processed foods — and not clear which ones should be targeted, said Aviva Musicus, science director for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, which advocates for food policies.

    “The range of ultraprocessed foods is just so wide,” she said.

    Instead, it’s better to be mindful of the ingredients in foods. Check the labels and make choices that align with the current U.S. Dietary Guidelines, she suggested.

    “We have really good evidence that added sugar is not great for us. We have evidence that high-sodium foods are not great for us,” she said. “We have great evidence that fruits and vegetables which are minimally processed are really good for us.”

    It’s important not to vilify certain foods, she added. Many consumers don’t have the time or money to cook most meals from scratch.

    “I think foods should be joyous and delicious and shouldn’t involve moral judgment,” Musicus said.

    ___

    The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • Death toll is now 8 in listeria outbreak tied to Boar’s Head deli meat, CDC says

    Death toll is now 8 in listeria outbreak tied to Boar’s Head deli meat, CDC says

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    At least nine people have died after being infected with listeria from Boar’s Head deli meats tied to a massive recall last month, federal health officials said Wednesday.

    The new food poisoning toll includes two deaths in South Carolina plus one each in Florida, New Mexico, Tennessee and New York, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. Three deaths were previously confirmed in people who lived in Illinois, New Jersey and Virginia.

    At least 57 people have been sickened and hospitalized in the outbreak. Illnesses were reported starting in late May and have continued into August, the agency said. It is the largest listeria outbreak in the U.S. since 2011, and Boar’s Head has recalled more than 7 million pounds of deli products.

    Listeria infections are caused by a hardy type of bacteria that can survive and even thrive during refrigeration. An estimated 1,600 people get listeria food poisoning each year and about 260 die, according to the CDC. Infections can be hard to pinpoint because symptoms may occur quickly — or up to 10 weeks after eating contaminated food.

    The infections are especially dangerous for older people, those who are pregnant or those with weakened immune systems.

    The problem was discovered when a Boar’s Head liverwurst sample collected by health officials in Maryland tested positive for listeria. Further testing showed that the type of bacteria was the same strain causing illnesses in people.

    Boar’s Head officials originally recalled liverwurst and other products meant to be sliced in retail delis with sell-by dates from July 25 to Aug. 30. On July 29, the recall was expanded to include all foods produced at the firm’s plant in Jarratt, Virginia. The products included those sliced at deli counters as well as some prepackaged retail sausage, frankfurters and bacon.

    All the recalled deli meats have been removed from stores and are no longer available, Boar’s Head officials said on the company’s website. The products were distributed to stores nationwide, as well as to the Cayman Islands, the Dominican Republic, Mexico and Panama, U.S. Agriculture Department officials said.

    CDC officials urged consumers to check their refrigerators for the recalled products. Look for EST. 12612 or P-12612 inside the USDA mark of inspection on the product labels, some of which have sell-by dates that extend into October. Discard recalled foods and thoroughly clean and sanitize refrigerator and other surfaces they touched.

    Many illnesses caused by food poisoning are short-lived, but listeria infections can have devastating effects.

    In Virginia, Gunter “Garshon” Morgenstein, of Newport News, died on July 18 from a brain infection caused by listeria bacteria, an illness that was confirmed to be linked to the contaminated Boar’s Head products.

    Morgenstein, 88, was a German-born Holocaust survivor who moved to Canada and then the U.S. as a young man and later became a flamboyant hair stylist, according to his son, Garshon Morgenstein. During his 70-year career, his father styled celebrities such as the singer Tom Jones and was known for his funny, outgoing personality, Garshon Morgenstein said.

    Gunter Morgenstein enjoyed liverwurst, usually spread on bagels, and bought it regularly, insisting on the Boar’s Head brand because he believed it was top quality, his son said.

    He fell ill in early July and was hospitalized on July 8, eventually becoming so sick that doctors said he suffered permanent brain damage and was unlikely to recover. Family members withdrew life support, his son said.

    After Morgenstein’s death, a review of receipts showed that he bought the recalled deli meat tied to the outbreak on June 30. The family has hired a lawyer, Houston-based Ron Simon.

    “It’s really just a senseless accident and tragedy for something that just should not have ever happened,” his son said. “He still had many good years left.”

    ___

    The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • Despite H5N1 bird flu outbreaks in dairy cattle, raw milk enthusiasts are uncowed

    Despite H5N1 bird flu outbreaks in dairy cattle, raw milk enthusiasts are uncowed

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    Government scientists are warning consumers to stay away from raw milk, citing research showing “high viral load” of avian influenza in samples collected from infected cows — as well as a disturbing cluster of dead barn cats who’d consumed contaminated raw milk.

    “We continue to strongly advise against the consumption of raw milk,” said Donald Prater, acting director of the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition at the Food and Drug Administration.

    But raw milk enthusiasts are doubling down on the claimed benefits and safety of their favorite elixir, and say the government warnings are nothing more than “fearmongering.”

    Mark McAfee, founder of Fresno’s Raw Farm and the Raw Milk Institute, said his phone has been ringing off the hook with “customers asking for H5N1 milk because they want immunity from it.” (Bird flu has not been detected in California’s dairy herds.)

    Other raw milk drinkers, such as Peg Coleman, a medical microbiologist who runs Coleman Scientific Consulting, a Groton, N.Y.-based food safety consulting company, claimed the government’s warnings have no basis in reality.

    Coleman, who is an advisor to the Raw Milk Institute, has provided expert testimony on the benefits of the unpasteurized dairy product in courtrooms across the nation.

    “It’s a fear factor. It’s an opinion factor. It’s based on 19th century evidence. It’s absolutely ridiculous,” she said, citing research that shows healthy gut biomes and breast milk provide immune system benefits.

    The process of heating milk to a specific temperature for a specific period of time and then allowing it to rapidly chill is named for the French chemist and germ theory pioneer Louis Pasteur. Recently, the FDA reaffirmed the effectiveness of pasteurization in destroying Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) and other viruses, as well as harmful pathogenic bacteria and other microorganisms.

    Coleman, however, says the risk of illness are overblown.

    “This is all people’s opinions, their gut feelings, their ignorance,” she said. “I think that if there were a study done, and the microbiota of raw milk drinkers was tested, you might very well find a healthier gut microbiota that’s better able to withstand occasional challenges.”

    It’s a message that health officers and food safety experts say is dangerous and foolhardy, especially at a time when government investigators are scrambling to understand the extent of dairy herd outbreaks, and the potential for harm.

    “Deliberating consuming raw milk in the hope of becoming immune to avian influenza is playing Russian roulette with your health,” said Michael Payne, a researcher and outreach coordinator at the Western Institute for Food Safety and Security at UC Davis. “Deliberately trying to infect yourself with a known pathogen flies in the face of all medical knowledge and common sense.”

    He and other food safety experts say the safest way to consume dairy is to ingest only pasteurized milk products.

    “It’s been the gold standard for more than a century,” he said.

    The highly pathogenic avian influenza virus has been found in 36 herds in nine states, and detected in samples of commercially sold, pasteurized milk. Testing has shown those viral fragments to be inactive — neutralized by the pasteurization process.

    The live virus, on the other hand, has been detected in raw cow’s milk and colostrum — the nutrient rich milk expressed by mammals in the first days after giving birth — and a study that examined dead barn cats at bird-flu-infected dairies in Texas and Kansas suggests contaminated raw milk could be dangerous for other mammals, including humans.

    However, the researchers were unable to definitively show the cats acquired the virus via raw milk; it is possible they consumed diseased birds.

    It’s a point that Coleman has seized on — highlighting it as proof that the government’s caution regarding drinking raw milk is specious.

    “Show me that it infected the cats through the GI tract,” she said. “Otherwise, you are just … crying wolf trying to blame raw milk or saying … that raw milk is inherently dangerous, even when the scientific evidence does not support that opinion.”

    She noted that the cats’ symptoms were not gastrointestinal in nature. Instead, they developed depressed mental states, their bodies showed stiff movements, they lost coordination, produced discharge from their eyes and noses, and suffered blindness. More than half of the farms’ cats died. She said even if the cats had contracted the virus via the milk, it was likely a result of breathing in milk droplets rather than from consuming it.

    “Have you ever seen a cat eat?” asked Coleman. “It’s messy. If they got the disease from the milk, it’s probably because they breathed it in.”

    Eric Burrough, a professor and veterinary diagnostic pathologist at Iowa State University who led the cat study, acknowledged that there were things they were unable to control for and other things “we do not know”; the analysis was “diagnostic.”

    But he and his team were able to show that the cats fed on contaminated raw milk with high concentrations of the virus and that the pattern of infection and death “does not align with random exposure to wild birds,” he said.

    As for Coleman and McAfee’s belief that stomach acid and a healthy gut biome would offer protection, he noted previous studies that showed cats eating wild birds did get the virus, suggesting those safeguards are not sufficient to protect mammals against bird flu.

    He said “there is also the possibility that virus could enter via the tonsils in the pharynx of the cats prior to ingestion in both the bird consumption and milk consumption scenarios.”

    In any case, said Payne, there’s enough concern out there right now that should give people pause about consuming dairy products that have not been pasteurized.

    Even Coleman acknowledged that toddlers and young children — who have been known to be messy eaters — might consume milk differently than adults. And if her messy eating theory has weight with the cats, “it’s something to think about” with children.

    So far, the virus does not seem to have evolved any genetic adaptations that would make it more amenable to pass between people.

    Only one person — a Texas dairy worker infected in March — has so far been reported to have acquired the disease from cattle. His symptoms were mild — just a moderate case of conjunctivitis, or pink eye, according to a case report in the New England Journal of Medicine.

    Local and state health departments have tested about 25 other people for the virus and monitored more than 100 for symptoms.

    This particular bird flu virus originated in China in 1996, but the clade — or subvariant, known as 2.3.4.4b — found in U.S. dairy cattle became dominant in 2020. It has since killed hundreds of millions of domestic and wild birds — and has been detected on every continent except Australia. It has also jumped to mammals, and is responsible for killing at least 48 different species, including elephant seals, dolphins and sea lions.

    Researchers now believe this clade of H5N1 virus was introduced by birds to cattle at one site in the Texas Panhandle, and then spread by cattle-to-cattle transmission as cows were moved between different farms. Evidence also shows that infections have spread from cattle to domestic poultry. And samples have been discovered in wastewater.

    There have been 887 confirmed cases of H5N1 human infection across 23 countries since 2003. Of those, 462 were fatal. It is unclear if there were more mild cases that went undetected, something that could potentially reduce the 52% fatality rate.

    However, epidemiologists say HPAI is dangerous — and potentially fatal. Considering the global, cross-species spread of illness, they are urging people to be cautious and avoid raw milk.

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    Susanne Rust

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  • No, table salt doesn’t contain sand and glass

    No, table salt doesn’t contain sand and glass

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    Does the salt in your kitchen contain shards of glass? A Facebook video claims it does.

    An April 9 Facebook video was filmed in a supermarket aisle in which a person reaches for Morton Salt and Walmart’s plain salt.

    “This item has killed more people than COVID,” a man’s voice says. “Why do I say this? Because it is 50% sea salt, 25% sand and 25% glass,” he added.

    The voice then claims that consuming the salt “cuts up your arterial and venous network and that’s how you get high blood pressure.”

    The Facebook video was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

    The ingredients listed in Morton iodized table salt are salt, potassium iodide (a type of salt used to add iodine to table salt), dextrose (a type of sugar added to prevent the iodine added from evaporating), and calcium silicate (a compound added to prevent salt crystals from sticking together). Morton also sells table salt that does not contain iodine, a mineral in foods such as eggs and fish. Iodine deficiency can lead to swelling of the thyroid gland.

    Walmart’s Great Value plain salt contains salt and yellow prussiate of soda, another compound that prevents salt crystals from sticking together.

    Glass is in neither salt’s ingredients list.

    The Facebook post gave no evidence that table salt contains sand and glass; a screenshot in the video has text that matches a website promoting natural wellness — which also provides no evidence that table salt contains sand and glass.

    PolitiFact contacted Morton Salt and Walmart for a statement. Neither replied.

    This is not the first time this claim has circulated online. A February 2018 Reddit post asked whether a similar claim was true and linked to a YouTube video, which the site has removed for violating community standards.

    Although high blood pressure, also known as hypertension, and salt consumption are linked, this is because salt contains sodium, and a high-sodium diet “can increase your blood pressure and your risk for heart disease and stroke,” the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports. The CDC adds, “Together, heart disease and stroke kill more Americans each year than any other cause.”

    Canned foods, pizza and savory snacks contain high sodium.

    More than 1.2 billion people globally have hypertension, according to the World Health Organization. Eating a low-sodium diet is a key recommendation for reducing hypertension risk. 

    We rate the claim that Morton Salt and other plain and iodized table salts contain glass that cuts arteries and sparks high blood pressure Pants on Fire!

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  • Social media posts get the details wrong about ProduceMaxx

    Social media posts get the details wrong about ProduceMaxx

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    Are grocery stores that spray mist on fresh produce spraying toxic chemicals? 

    That’s the claim in two social media videos that appear to have been recorded in the same store.

    “If you are buying organic produce at the grocery store, there is something called (ProduceMaxx) on top of all the produce,” a March 31 Instagram video’s narrator said as he stood in the produce section of a Sprouts Farmers Market, part of a grocery store chain specializing in natural and organic foods. The narrator added that ProduceMaxx is “a bunch of pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, insecticides, and they’re also spraying antibiotics.” 

    The Instagram post’s caption said it’s “deceiving” to call the produce organic because “they are drenching” it in pesticides.

    A separate video shared the same day on Facebook featured a different person making a similar claim about ProduceMaxx. That video originated on TikTok, where it had more than 24,000 likes. Both videos said the product is so toxic its containers cannot not be disposed of in the regular trash.

    We found similar posts being shared on TikTok and X.

    These posts were flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.) 

    (Instagram screenshot)

    It’s accurate to call ProduceMaxx a pesticide; it’s registered as an antimicrobial pesticide with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which describes those products as substances used to “destroy or suppress the growth of harmful microorganisms such as bacteria, viruses, or fungi on inanimate objects and surfaces.”

    The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act defines a pesticide as a substance intended for “preventing, destroying, repelling, or mitigating any pests.” That includes cleaning products that control bacteria, according to the EPA.

    The EPA categorizes pesticides in four ways: conventional (synthetic chemicals used to kill pests); antimicrobial (for microorganisms such as bacteria, viruses or fungi on inanimate objects); biopesticides (derived from natural materials such as animals and plants); and inert ingredients (such as emulsifiers and solvents).

    But the social media posts are inaccurate to describe ProduceMaxx as an herbicide, fungicide, insecticide or antibiotic, said Nigel Glennie, a spokesperson for Ecolab, the parent company of ChemStar, which makes ProduceMaxx.

    The posts also get it wrong when they say ProduceMaxx can’t be used on organic produce and its containers can’t be thrown away in the regular trash. The product is certified by the Organic Materials Review Institute, an independent organic food standards group, as safe to use in organic food production, and a product safety data sheet says empty containers can be recycled and that unused product can be diluted and flushed into the sewer.

    Glennie said although ProduceMaxx appears alongside pesticides in EPA databases, the product is more accurately described as an antimicrobial produce wash. ProduceMaxx kills 99.999% of one type of E.coli, Salmonella enterica and listeria, according to its product label.

    ProduceMaxx is “added to water to reduce bacteria on fruit and vegetables, control decay-causing bacteria in hydrating water, and reduce bacterial pathogens on fruit and vegetable surfaces,” said Glennie, who added it helps to extend shelf life and reduce food waste.  

    Glennie said more than 50 retail brands across more than 10,000 stores in North America use ProduceMaxx. It’s used professionally in grocery and convenience stores, kitchens and food service operations.

    ProduceMaxx is used to wash fruits and vegetables — including those cut for packaged products — to crisp produce, and to keep misting lines in stores clean and free of bacteria.

    ProduceMaxx label (Chemstar)

    ProduceMaxx uses hypochlorous acid as its active ingredient, combined with water and inorganic salt. 

    Hypochlorous acid occurs naturally in humans and other mammals, and is created by white blood cells to fight infection. It’s also created commercially for skin care products, disinfecting swimming pools, wound care and in dentistry to treat water lines in offices and as a mouth rinse. It is used in health care settings, including to disinfect against COVID-19.

    Lauren Frank, a Sprouts Farmers Market spokesperson, confirmed that the grocery chain uses ProduceMaxx in its stores. She said products such as ProduceMaxx “are used extensively in the food industry because they can reduce bacteria and foodborne pathogens.” 

    Does spraying ProduceMaxx on organic produce mean those foods can no longer be considered organic? No. 

    ProduceMaxx “may be used in certified organic production or food processing and handling according to the USDA National Organic Program regulations” says a certificate from OMRI, a nonprofit that reviews products intended for use in certified organic production against organic standards. 

    “If this product is used in accordance with our certificate, then it is compliant for use in certified organic operations,” Organic Materials Review Institute spokesperson Roger Plant said. The institute’s certificate for ProduceMaxx says it  may be used in direct contact with food at levels approved by the FDA or EPA.

    “Hypochlorous acid is allowed to contact organic produce,” Plant added. He pointed to a Federal Code section about nonorganic substances allowed for use on food labeled as organic that lists hypochlorous acid, the active ingredient in ProduceMaxx.

    Typically, produce washed with ProduceMaxx must later be rinsed with water to meet organic standards, but that does not apply to its use in grocery store misting lines. Glennie said ProduceMaxx is more heavily diluted when it’s used in misting lines to meet the EPA’s regulatory standard for chlorine in safe drinking water of 4 milligrams per liter.

    Our ruling

    An Instagram post said ProduceMaxx sprayed on organic produce at grocery stores contains pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, insecticides and antibiotics.

    ProduceMaxx is EPA-registered as an antimicrobial pesticide, but it’s not a herbicide, fungicide, insecticide or antibiotic. 

    The product is certified for use on organic food by an independent standards group, and federal law allows its active ingredient, hypochlorous acid, to be used on food labeled organic.

    The statement contains an element of truth but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression. We rate it Mostly False.

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  • PolitiFact – No es cierto que China prohibió la Coca-Cola para el consumo humano

    PolitiFact – No es cierto que China prohibió la Coca-Cola para el consumo humano

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    Una serie de publicaciones en las redes sociales afirman que China ha prohibido la Coca-Cola para el consumo humano y la ha clasificado como material de limpieza. 

    “En una decisión sin precedentes, el Comité Central Chino para la Calidad de los Alimentos ha anunciado la prohibición de la venta de Coca-Cola para consumo humano en todo el país”, dice una publicación en Facebook del 21 de enero. 

    Esta también afirma que “la popular bebida carbonatada, producida por la American Coca-Cola Company, será transferida a la categoría de líquidos sanitarios recomendados para la limpieza de tuberías”.

    Pero eso no es cierto.

    La publicación fue marcada como parte del esfuerzo de Meta para combatir las noticias falsas y la desinformación en su plataforma. (Lea más sobre nuestra colaboración con Meta, propietaria de Facebook e Instagram).

    La publicación también dice que “esta drástica medida se basa en una exhaustiva investigación científica”. También menciona estudios que supuestamente se realizaron con más de 500 prisioneros, donde se encontró que el consumo continuo de Coca-Cola causaba graves consecuencias para la salud.

    Pero la publicación no enlaza a los supuestos estudios, ni hemos encontrado pruebas de estos. 

    Una página web en ruso, la cual afirma que sus textos “son parodias grotescas de la realidad y no son noticias reales”, publicó en 2018 un artículo diciendo que China prohibió la Coca-Cola.

    PolitiFact realizó una búsqueda en páginas web del gobierno de la República Popular China y de palabras clave en español e inglés y esta no ofrece resultado sobre la supuesta decisión del país asiático de prohibir la Coca-Cola para el consumo humano. La administración que regula los alimentos en China es la Administración Estatal de Alimentos y Medicamentos de China y no encontramos existencia de un supuesto Comité Central Chino para la Calidad de los Alimentos.

    Tampoco encontramos ningún comunicado oficial al respecto en la página web de Coca-Cola en China. Tradujimos el texto al español a través del traductor automático de Google.

    Un representante de prensa de Coca-Coca dijo a PolitiFact que la afirmación es falsa.

    No encontramos ningún reporte en la prensa diciendo que China prohibió la Coca-Cola. En la página web de Swire Coca-Cola, el embotellador de Coca-Cola en China, no hay indicación de que hayan retirado el producto de su portfolio.

    La revista CEOMagazine el 29 de enero publicó una entrevista con el presidente de la unidad operativa de China y Mongolia de Coca-Cola, Gilles Leclerc. La entrevista no menciona la supuesta prohibición.

    Ya que no hay evidencia de que China prohibió la Coca-Cola para el consumo humano, calificamos la publicación como Falsa. 

    Lea más reportes de PolitiFact en Español aquí.

    Debido a limitaciones técnicas, partes de nuestra página web aparecen en inglés. Estamos trabajando en mejorar la presentación.



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  • PolitiFact – Tyson Foods invests in insects, but not for your chicken nuggets

    PolitiFact – Tyson Foods invests in insects, but not for your chicken nuggets

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    Meat-processing giant Tyson Foods in October announced a partnership with Protix, a Netherlands-based startup that produces insect ingredients.

    That has bugged some social media users, who worry those insects will end up in their food.

    “Watch those chicken nuggets!!!” said a Dec. 9 Facebook post caption. Below was a screenshot showing part of Tyson Foods’ press release about the Protix partnership.

    This post was flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.)

    We found other social media posts making similar comments about Tyson’s interest in bugs.

    The screenshot shared on Facebook, however, shared only the first paragraph of the Oct. 17 press release. The full release says Tyson is taking a minority stake in Protix and partnering with it to build an insect-ingredient facility in the U.S.

    That facility, Tyson said, would turn food manufacturing byproducts into “high-quality insect proteins and lipids which will primarily be used in the pet food, aquaculture, and livestock industries.”

    Essentially, black soldier flies feeding on waste from Tyson’s processing would be turned into food for animals.

    “​​In addition to ingredients for the aquaculture and pet food industries, processed larvae may also be used as ingredients within livestock and plant feed,” the press release said.

    Edible insects have been pitched as a solution for world hunger and as a more environmentally friendly protein source than eating livestock. But eating bugs for food isn’t yet widespread or accepted in the U.S.

    (The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has no specific regulations about insects as food for people, an FDA spokesperson told PolitiFact. But insects sold as food for people must comply with the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, that is, they must be safe and produced in sanitary conditions. The act also requires manufacturers to label ingredients by their common names.) 

    Neither Protix nor Tyson signaled whether they will someday venture into insect foods for human consumption. But the word “primarily” in Tyson’s press release may leave room for interpretation about future plans. A Tyson spokesperson told PolitiFact, though, that products made at the planned U.S. facility won’t be for human consumption. 

    They will be used as a sustainable ingredient in premium pet food or as protein alternatives for “aquatic organisms,” such as salmon and shrimp, the Tyson spokesperson said. Protix did not respond to a request for comment.

    In an October CNN article about the partnership, Tyson Foods Chief Financial Officer John Tyson said the insects aren’t going into human food. “Today, we’re focused on more of [an] ingredient application with insect protein than we are a consumer application,” he said.

    The October press release didn’t mention using insects in food for people. None of the products with insect ingredients Protix lists on its website are for human consumption, either.

    Tyson Foods’ chicken nuggets are made with chicken, water and wheat flour. Other ingredients, such as onion and garlic, are added for flavoring. There are no plans to add black soldier flies or other insects into the mix, a company spokesperson said. The claim is False.

     

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  • What to Do If Your Turkey Is Still Frozen on Thanksgiving Morning

    What to Do If Your Turkey Is Still Frozen on Thanksgiving Morning

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    We independently select these products—if you buy from one of our links, we may earn a commission. All prices were accurate at the time of publishing.

    Even the most well-seasoned cooks have experienced the dread of the turkey still being frozen or half frozen on Thanksgiving morning. Maybe you decided to host last minute, or your fridge was so packed with holiday meal prep, that big bird in your fridge just did not thaw.

    Don’t panic — whether you’re 24 hours out from roasting the turkey or your family is arrive later in the afternoon, you’ve got options. This handy guide will walk you through what to avoid, as well as how to thaw or roast your turkey depending on its near frozen state.

    Mistakes to Avoid When Quick-Thawing Your Turkey

    The risk of giving you and your guests food poisoning is just too great.

    So, why can’t you do any of these things? Besides looking silly with a hair dryer, if any part of the turkey is within the temperature “danger zone” of 40°F to 140°F for longer than two hours, the likelihood increases that it has developed unsafe levels of bacteria and related toxins. This means that even if the inside of your turkey is still frozen, once the outside thaws to above 40°F, it’s in the danger zone.

    Even cooking your turkey thoroughly in the oven doesn’t guarantee that the turkey is safe to eat — most bacteria will be destroyed, but the illness-causing toxins remain. There are times when you can bend the food safety rules and times when you shouldn’t. This is just one of those times when it’s not worth the risk.

    If You Have a Few Hours to Spare

    The best way to thaw a turkey is to leave it in the fridge for a few days, but if you’re reading this, then that option has probably passed you by. Not to worry — you can also thaw your turkey more quickly by submerging it in cold water.

    Thawed this way in cold water, estimate roughly 30 minutes for every pound of turkey (so, an 8-pound turkey will take 4 hours to thaw using this method). This can of course take a while for a large turkey, so be sure to plan the rest of your meal — and the dinner bell — accordingly. Personally, I like this method the best if my turkey has already done some thawing in the fridge but is still partially frozen. The cold water helps it finish thawing the rest of the way time for dinner.

    If There’s No Time to Thaw

    If you’re up against the clock and have no time left for even the “quick” cold-water thaw, then just cook the turkey frozen. It’s perfectly safe to cook a frozen or partially frozen turkey in the oven — you just need to allow some extra cooking time, according to the USDA.

    Estimate 50 percent longer cooking time for a completely frozen turkey and around 25 percent longer for a partially frozen turkey. (For example, a completely thawed unstuffed turkey that’s 18 pounds will take roughly 4 hours to cook, and a frozen turkey will take around 6 hours). In either case, check the temperature and cook the turkey until it registers 165°F in both the breast and the thigh.

    The advantage of cooking a frozen turkey is that you still get to sit down to dinner in a timely manner with none the wiser for your turkey snafu earlier in the day. The disadvantage is that you’re stuck with a fairly basic roast turkey — no brining, deep-frying, or any other fancy turkey techniques here. You can, however, brush the turkey with butter and rub it with salt, pepper, and spices partway through cooking to give it some color and flavor.

    But even when cooking a frozen turkey, you can still count on plenty of crispy skin and tender meat, and most importantly, Thanksgiving is saved.

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    Emma Christensen

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  • Opinion: California didn’t ban Skittles. But it tackled a food safety problem the FDA hasn’t solved

    Opinion: California didn’t ban Skittles. But it tackled a food safety problem the FDA hasn’t solved

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    Last month, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed into law California’s Food Safety Act banning four ingredients that are linked to health risks. These substances — red dye no. 3, propyl paraben, brominated vegetable oil and potassium bromate, currently found in some candies, sodas and baked goods — will not be allowed in the state’s foods starting in 2027. All four are banned from foods in the European Union (which only allows red no. 3 in candied and cocktail cherries), but, California aside, they remain perfectly legal in the U.S.

    New York is considering a similar law that would also ban a fifth substance previously included in California’s law — titanium dioxide, which is used in Skittles. That’s why the California measure got dubbed the “Skittles ban” (a name that stuck even after titanium dioxide was cut from the draft).

    California is the first state to go beyond Food and Drug Administration regulations by banning the other four additives. Should it have deferred to the FDA?

    The challenges facing the FDA make the case for state action. Sluggish and irregular safety reviews, a fast-track ingredient approval loophole that is abused by manufacturers, and a focus on acute food poisoning over long-term diet all hinder the agency’s ability to address the growing risks associated with our food supply.

    The FDA is required to review the safety of any new food additive and grant approval before it can be used. If evidence indicates that an additive is unsafe, the FDA is supposed to decline or limit its use. Three of the substances in California’s law were approved by this standard review: potassium bromate, Red Dye No. 3 and brominated vegetable oil. But the FDA is reevaluating the safety of the latter two and has proposed, though not finalized, a rule to ban brominated vegetable oil from the food supply.

    The fourth substance set to be banned in California, propyl paraben, was approved through what’s effectively a loophole in the FDA system. Ingredients classified as “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS) are exempt from the additive category and thus from careful FDA review. Congress crafted this exemption to be used infrequently, primarily to keep common ingredients like salt and spices on the market without an onerous approval process. But as food companies sought to avoid the rigorous food additive review, GRAS applications piled up.

    Without the resources to research the applications, and lacking further support from Congress, the FDA allowed manufacturers to skip the application and determine GRAS status with only a “voluntary notification process.” This means companies can choose whether to let the FDA know they believe their substance is GRAS — in which case FDA can affirm that decision — or they can self-affirm GRAS status and market the substance without ever notifying the FDA. Thousands of substances have entered the food supply this way. Even when companies voluntarily notify, as was the case for propyl paraben in 1984, the FDA does not conduct a full safety review to affirm GRAS status.

    Since GRAS notification is voluntary, the FDA does not know all the substances in our food supply. One study found that of the 4,284 GRAS determinations made as of January 2011, just 582 were cleared through the FDA’s voluntary notification process.

    Although the FDA has the authority to revoke GRAS status or an additive approval, the agency reviews the safety of greenlighted ingredients sporadically, rather than regularly — and often slowly.

    Take for example, trans fat from partially hydrogenated oils, a GRAS substance used for decades in commercial baked goods and other products. A 2004 citizen petition asked the FDA to look into the safety of these oils, but it wasn’t until 2015 that the FDA determined that they were not GRAS and banned them in food starting in 2020. By the time the FDA got around to this, New York City had already banned them in restaurants (in 2006), as had California (in 2008).

    The under-regulation of food additives is part of a larger challenge. FDA vetting focuses more on acute risks, such as food-borne illness, than on longer-term risks from diet. Of the agency’s more than $1 billion budget for its foods program, only 7% goes to nutrition and labeling, its major strategies to address diet-related disease. Yet while foodborne illness causes about 3,000 deaths per year, 1.5 million deaths in 2018 — more than half of all deaths that year — resulted from conditions linked to diet.

    But states moving to ban substances isn’t a perfect solution either. They generally don’t have the resources to conduct comprehensive safety reviews, and it would be more efficient to beef up the FDA’s infrastructure than to duplicate costly systems across states and potentially create a confusing patchwork of bans.

    We desperately need change at the federal level. The Government Accountability Office reported on flaws in the GRAS system in 2010, and the FDA has not addressed the majority of the recommendations, such as regularly reviewing the safety of GRAS substances and requiring companies to provide basic information about these substances. The FDA urgently needs additional Congressional funding to take action on food safety for all ingredients, with a particular eye toward diet-related chronic disease.

    In the meantime, states like California will have to keep taking the lead on evaluating harmful ingredients and show the federal government how it can be done.

    Emily Broad Leib is a clinical professor of law at Harvard Law School and faculty director of the school’s Food Law and Policy Clinic.

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    Emily Broad Leib

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  • Rishi Sunak to sign UK-India trade deal without binding worker or environment pledges

    Rishi Sunak to sign UK-India trade deal without binding worker or environment pledges

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    Voiced by artificial intelligence.

    LONDON — Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s trade deal with India will not include legally enforceable commitments on labor rights or environmental standards, five people briefed on the text have told POLITICO.

    British businesses and unions now fear the deal’s already-finalized labor and environment chapters will undercut U.K. workers’ rights and efforts to combat climate change.

    Sunak’s government is racing to score a win with the booming South Asian economy ahead of the 2024 election. His plans for a return trip to India in October with the aim of sealing the pact are still on track.

    Sunak and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi added impetus to negotiations when they met on the sidelines of the G20 in New Delhi early this month. The 13th round of talks continues in London this week.

    Just days after Sunak’s meeting with Modi, Badenoch’s team shared the deal’s labor and environment chapters with businesses, unions and trade experts on a September 13 briefing call.

    Key enforceable dispute resolution powers which the U.K. set out to negotiate are missing from those chapters, said the five people briefed on the text. It means neither London nor New Delhi can hold the other to their climate, environmental and workers’ rights commitments.

    Businesses, unions and NGOs now fear the deal could undercut British firms because Indian firms operate to less stringent and expensive environmental and labor standards. Firms and unions say their access to the negotiations was curtailed earlier this year as talks progressed.

    “Industry also wants binding commitments — partly for greater certainty, partly because businesses are made up of people who themselves want to be properly treated and to avoid climate catastrophe,” said a senior British businessperson from the services sector briefed on the chapters. They were granted anonymity to speak candidly about the negotiations.

    “Suppression of trade unions, child labor and forced labor are all widespread in India,” said Rosa Crawford, trade lead at the Trades Union Congress (TUC) — the largest coalition of unions in Britain. “But the labor chapter that the U.K. government has negotiated cannot be used to clamp down on these abuses and could lead to more good jobs being offshored to exploitative jobs in India.”

    The Department for Business and Trade said it does not comment on live negotiations and that it will only sign a deal that benefits the U.K. and its economy.

    ‘Everyone was deeply unhappy’

    At the outset of the talks, the British government committed to negotiating enforceable labor and environment chapters as it laid out its strategic approach. “We remain committed to upholding our high environmental, labour, food safety and animal welfare standards in our trade agreement with India,” the government said in January 2022.

    Indian and British officials say the labor and environment chapters are now closed and are not up for discussion. The U.K.’s first post-Brexit trade pacts with Australia and New Zealand have dispute settlement mechanisms in both these chapters. Three people POLITICO spoke to for this piece said it was an achievement in itself that Britain was able to get such chapters in a deal with India.

    Businesses, unions and NGOs have all been concerned after Kemi Badenoch closed the key forums in February to carry out a required review of their activities | Dan Kitwood/Getty Images

    But, as the U.K.-India deal stands, if either country were to weaken its environmental standards or workers’ rights “the other party would not have recourse to initiate consultations on changes in laws,” said a person familiar with the content of the chapters. “There is no dispute settlement in the environment and labor chapters.”

    British firms and unions are also concerned that the pact the EU is negotiating with India has enforceable chapters “bound by sanctions in case the parties don’t comply,” the same person said. Those EU-India chapters are not yet finalized.

    British stakeholders “are totally up in arms,” said a former trade department official familiar with the briefing. “Everyone was deeply unhappy.”

    India has changed its labor laws to deprive workers of the right to strike. Over the past year several Indian states, including Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh, have weakened their workers’ rights laws making 12-hour daily shifts and overnight shifts for women legal as Apple iPhone maker Foxconn sets up multiple semiconductor factories and assembly plants throughout India.  

    Adding enforceable chapters would only slow down negotiations, said an Indian government official. “If you put in too much of these things into a trade deal, then it delays the process.” The U.K. and India are already “bound by” their international commitments on labor and climate, they added.

    The deal “is dire for working people because trade unions were excluded from the trade talks,” said the TUC’s Crawford. Nearly three years ago, ministers pitched the idea of involving unions in 11 influential Trade Advisory Groups (TAGs) that gave input on ongoing trade negotiations.  

    Businesses, unions and NGOs have all been concerned after Britain’s trade chief Kemi Badenoch closed the key forums in February to carry out a required review of their activities. International Trade Minister Nigel Huddleston received officials’ recommendations to restructure the groups in mid-August. A final decision is expected before the end of the year.

    With 40-50 people on the U.K. government’s current briefing calls about the India trade deal there’s little businesses or unions can do to feed into negotiations. Officials can “only really be in transmit mode,” said a business representative familiar with the briefings.

    “What this means in real terms is that decisions are being made about the future of people’s livelihoods, people’s health, and the environment we all depend on without any input from those who will be impacted,” said Hannah Conway, trade and agriculture policy advisor at the NGO Transform Trade.

    “It’s crucial,” she said, “that the government addresses its democratic deficit on trade policy by undertaking meaningful consultation with civil society and businesses.”

    “It’s high time the government rethinks its approach,” said the TUC’s Crawford, “and includes unions in trade talks — that’s how you get trade deals that work for working people.”

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    Graham Lanktree

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