The average consumer is 15 times more likely to drown in the bathtub than to die of pesticide-related causes, and they are 1,500 times more likely to die in a car wreck than die of pesticide-related causes. But people still get in their car and drive.
--Jayson Lusk
It's interesting to think through examples where we as humans are both risk-blind and probability-blind. We fear flying and would rather drive, despite overwhelming evidence that the risk of the latter vastly exceeds the risk of the former. In my case, even though I know the relative risks of flying versus driving, I'd still rather drive.
Our minds evolved to their modern form perhaps half a million to a million years ago, long before statistics and probability were conceived as a way of looking at reality, and long before our day-to-day reality became as complex as it currently is. And once you have any familiarity with domains of behavioral finance or the psychology of human decision-making, you quickly absorb the disturbing truth that the decision making process of our own brains is obscure and opaque to us. We don't even understand ourselves.
Back to flying for a second. When you think about what flying really entails--basically waiting in a line to use a kiosk, followed by waiting in another line to get into another line to line up for a shoeless, beltless and semi-dehumanizing kabuki theater of body scans, luggage x-rays, and getting yelled at, followed by another long wait, followed by another line, followed by multiple hours in a cramped seat inside an aluminum tube breathing in other peoples' germs--all of a sudden a long drive doesn't seem so bad. Even when we know all the statistics. Thus it's completely understandable that our brains tell us to avoid the entire experience of flying.
I enjoyed writing that last paragraph, but it pretty much ruined flying for me for a while.
Now, on to pesticides. One thing that's extremely compelling to our hindbrains about PESTICIDE RISK!!1!! is its vividness. It brings to mind rhetorically powerful books like Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, spunky activists like Erin Brockovich, and infamous pollution disasters like the 1970s-era Love Canal. All you have to do is juxtapose these stories with a few reports of babies with birth defects, or young women with cancer (even better if you have photos), and you can easily hack readers' amygdalae.
And of course not only do we fear multi-syllabic chemicals and pesticides, and we fear even more so the idea that we might actually be eating them.
But then again: How sedentary or active are you? Do you make sure to sleep properly? Do you use seat belts? How many (surprisingly toxic) acetominophen or ibuprofen pills do you take in a given week? How much sugar do you consume in a given week? How much alcohol? And to go "meta" for a moment: How much time do you spend worrying about things that seem worrisome... but aren't?
These would all be questions worth considering long before worrying about pesticides.
Don't get me wrong: I'm not telling you to go out and drink a glass of Roundup. I'm certainly not saying pesticides aren't bad. I'm just asking readers with critical thinking skills to think through what's worth worrying about.
Further Reading:
1) Jayson Lusk is the author of The Food Police, a book well worth reading and discussed here at Casual Kitchen in multiple posts.
2) Risk Savvy by Gerd Giggerenzer
3) For better risk awareness in the healthcare industry, see H. Gilbert Welch's excellent book Less Medicine, More Health.
4) Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
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Showing posts with label food safety. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food safety. Show all posts
Bumblebee Does a Very Public Recall of Canned Tuna. Does This Make You Feel Good (Or Bad) About Our Food Supply?
Readers, take a look at this recent news story from CNN about a recall of canned tuna:
Bumblebee Foods, Tri-Union Seafoods Recall Canned Chunk Light Tuna
To me, it's impressive that all of this information is available about a can of tuna sitting on your store shelf: the specific lots, the codes to each lot and so on. But what's even more impressive to me is the involved companies' willingness to go public--very public--with the recall.
By comparison, do you remember the so-called "tomato recall" back in 2008? The one handled so poorly that authorities couldn’t even trace the right vegetable? It turned out it wasn't tomatoes at all, but rather jalapenos that were the source of the contamination. Worse still, the "discovery" of that contamination only began long after people started getting sick.
Here, the tuna recall was anticipatory. It happened before anyone got sick, and it's plausible, even likely, that no one would have even gotten sick in the first place.
I'm sure this post sounds like I'm on Big Food’s payroll, that I've suddenly and inexplicably dropped my consumer empowerment philosophy and sold out to greedy corporate interests. Perhaps. And yet objectively, on some level, this little tuna recall is a small miracle. It's a miracle of high-quality manufacturing, of tracking products and shipments, of knowing what you made, and when you made it. And of being willing to tell the media and the public ahead of time, rather than following the all-too-typical corporate playbook of going radio silent, crossing your fingers... and hoping nobody gets seriously ill.
And yet, after reading the above article from CNN, and despite the fact that I'm intellectually well aware that these companies did the right thing and that our canned tuna supply is safe, the next time I open up a can of tuna, regardless of the brand, I'll make a mental association with this story, and I'll get a vaguely icky feeling, as if that next can of tuna is somehow contaminated too.
It's like these companies can't win for trying. They look bad even when they're perfectly anticipatory and no one gets sick.
Readers, what do you think about all this?
PS: There's one more angle to this story that ties in strikingly with one of Casual Kitchen's most important themes. Stay tuned for next week's post!
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
Easy. Do all your shopping at Amazon.com
via the links on this site! You can also link to me or subscribe to my RSS feed. Finally, consider sharing this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to Facebook, Twitter (follow me @danielckoontz!) or to bookmarking sites like reddit, digg or stumbleupon. I'm deeply grateful to my readers for their ongoing support.
Bumblebee Foods, Tri-Union Seafoods Recall Canned Chunk Light Tuna
To me, it's impressive that all of this information is available about a can of tuna sitting on your store shelf: the specific lots, the codes to each lot and so on. But what's even more impressive to me is the involved companies' willingness to go public--very public--with the recall.
By comparison, do you remember the so-called "tomato recall" back in 2008? The one handled so poorly that authorities couldn’t even trace the right vegetable? It turned out it wasn't tomatoes at all, but rather jalapenos that were the source of the contamination. Worse still, the "discovery" of that contamination only began long after people started getting sick.
Here, the tuna recall was anticipatory. It happened before anyone got sick, and it's plausible, even likely, that no one would have even gotten sick in the first place.
I'm sure this post sounds like I'm on Big Food’s payroll, that I've suddenly and inexplicably dropped my consumer empowerment philosophy and sold out to greedy corporate interests. Perhaps. And yet objectively, on some level, this little tuna recall is a small miracle. It's a miracle of high-quality manufacturing, of tracking products and shipments, of knowing what you made, and when you made it. And of being willing to tell the media and the public ahead of time, rather than following the all-too-typical corporate playbook of going radio silent, crossing your fingers... and hoping nobody gets seriously ill.
And yet, after reading the above article from CNN, and despite the fact that I'm intellectually well aware that these companies did the right thing and that our canned tuna supply is safe, the next time I open up a can of tuna, regardless of the brand, I'll make a mental association with this story, and I'll get a vaguely icky feeling, as if that next can of tuna is somehow contaminated too.
It's like these companies can't win for trying. They look bad even when they're perfectly anticipatory and no one gets sick.
Readers, what do you think about all this?
PS: There's one more angle to this story that ties in strikingly with one of Casual Kitchen's most important themes. Stay tuned for next week's post!
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
Easy. Do all your shopping at Amazon.com
via the links on this site! You can also link to me or subscribe to my RSS feed. Finally, consider sharing this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to Facebook, Twitter (follow me @danielckoontz!) or to bookmarking sites like reddit, digg or stumbleupon. I'm deeply grateful to my readers for their ongoing support.
The Tradeoff of "Sell By" Dates, Food Waste, and Food Safety
Readers: I might be posting a bit sporadically over the next few weeks. I'm still kind of recovering from last month's 29 straight days of new recipes.
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Why do we require "sell by" dates on food?
Well, ostensibly, it's to protect consumers. Nobody wants themselves or their loved ones to become sickened--or worse, killed--by food that's past its prime.
Unfortunately, greater safety usually involves tradeoffs. We could require perfectly safe cars, for example, but they would cost $infinity (and probably get really really bad gas mileage). Likewise, we could make our food supply perfectly safe, but we'd end up requiring food distributors and retailers to date food so conservatively that they'd be forced to throw out a nauseatingly high percentage of it.
This will make food prices go up. A lot. It's an obvious tradeoff, because farmers, transportation and delivery companies and the entire food retailing industry will need to recoup the cost of a far greater level of food waste.
And then there's the planet to think about. From an environmental standpoint, there's nothing more wasteful than using up perfectly good land to plant and grow food, then using energy to harvest it and take it to market... just so you can later throw that food away and have it decompose in a dumpster or landfill and give off still more greenhouse gases.
Worst of all, imagine requiring the disposal of food when there are people in our communities who might need that food to survive. All because of some dates and numbers somebody stamped on the outside of the package.
So, readers, where do you place your priorities? Towards food safety? Or towards minimizing food waste?
Do you think we should place relatively short term sell-by dates on food? Or are you willing to trust food consumers with some degree of agency and choice in deciding for themselves what foods are past their prime or not?
Or, do you think, as Ralph Nader so revealingly said, "the consumer must be protected at all times from his own indiscretion and vanity"--and therefore we consumers must defer to regulators and the government on this question?
If we choose the latter, who then do we go to to solve the problem of food waste? To the same regulators who inadvertently created the problem by requiring stringent sell by dates in the first place?
Share your thoughts!
Read Next: When Do You Throw Out Food? A Question for Readers
The inspiration for today's post came from a letter to the editor in an Australian newspaper, which I featured a few weeks ago in a Friday Links post.
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
Easy. Do all your shopping at Amazon.com via the links on this site! You can also link to me or subscribe to my RSS feed. Finally, consider sharing this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to Facebook, Twitter (follow me @danielckoontz!) or to bookmarking sites like reddit, digg or stumbleupon. I'm deeply grateful to my readers for their ongoing support.
******************************
Why do we require "sell by" dates on food?
Well, ostensibly, it's to protect consumers. Nobody wants themselves or their loved ones to become sickened--or worse, killed--by food that's past its prime.
Unfortunately, greater safety usually involves tradeoffs. We could require perfectly safe cars, for example, but they would cost $infinity (and probably get really really bad gas mileage). Likewise, we could make our food supply perfectly safe, but we'd end up requiring food distributors and retailers to date food so conservatively that they'd be forced to throw out a nauseatingly high percentage of it.
This will make food prices go up. A lot. It's an obvious tradeoff, because farmers, transportation and delivery companies and the entire food retailing industry will need to recoup the cost of a far greater level of food waste.
And then there's the planet to think about. From an environmental standpoint, there's nothing more wasteful than using up perfectly good land to plant and grow food, then using energy to harvest it and take it to market... just so you can later throw that food away and have it decompose in a dumpster or landfill and give off still more greenhouse gases.
Worst of all, imagine requiring the disposal of food when there are people in our communities who might need that food to survive. All because of some dates and numbers somebody stamped on the outside of the package.
So, readers, where do you place your priorities? Towards food safety? Or towards minimizing food waste?
Do you think we should place relatively short term sell-by dates on food? Or are you willing to trust food consumers with some degree of agency and choice in deciding for themselves what foods are past their prime or not?
Or, do you think, as Ralph Nader so revealingly said, "the consumer must be protected at all times from his own indiscretion and vanity"--and therefore we consumers must defer to regulators and the government on this question?
If we choose the latter, who then do we go to to solve the problem of food waste? To the same regulators who inadvertently created the problem by requiring stringent sell by dates in the first place?
Share your thoughts!
Read Next: When Do You Throw Out Food? A Question for Readers
The inspiration for today's post came from a letter to the editor in an Australian newspaper, which I featured a few weeks ago in a Friday Links post.
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
Easy. Do all your shopping at Amazon.com
via the links on this site! You can also link to me or subscribe to my RSS feed. Finally, consider sharing this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to Facebook, Twitter (follow me @danielckoontz!) or to bookmarking sites like reddit, digg or stumbleupon. I'm deeply grateful to my readers for their ongoing support.
Yoga Mats, Subway, and the Azodicarbonamide Controversy: Chemical Phobia In the Media Age
Readers, an intriguing event happened in the world of fear-based media over the past two weeks. Subway, the sandwich chain, caved to a food blogger, Food Babe, who demanded that the chain eliminate azodicarbonamide from its bread products. How did she manage to do it? In part by pointing out that azodicarbonamide, which Subway uses as a dough oxidizer, is also an ingredient used in making plastic yoga mats.
You read that right: yoga mats.
This isn't the first time Food Babe criticized Subway, but it's the first time she got serious traction doing so. Back in 2012, she wrote Is Subway Real Food?, a discouragingly unscientific critique of the preservatives and food additives Subway uses to prevent food spoilage. Then, in late 2013, she wrote her first post about azodicarbonamide where she appears to confuse industrial-scale use of the compound with food-grade uses. However, it wasn't until she created her Subway petition two weeks ago, with the exquisite slogan we want to really eat fresh, not yoga mat--that this issue caught fire.
Let's set aside for the moment the phobia that drives otherwise reasonably intelligent people to fear any chemical with more than four syllables. Instead, let's ask: is this controversy on azodicarbonamide a real controversy?
Unfortunately, this is the wrong question. If enough people think a controversy is real, it becomes real.
Subway must protect its brand, so it will replace the ingredient to avoid losing business. Simple. Management just had to decide at what point the issue became serious enough to justify the change. Whether azodicarbonamide is safe or not is irrelevant.
Of course there's another issue here: why would a food blogger who would fit right in with early 1900's muckrakers, who fancies herself the leader of an army, and who even implausibly takes credit for Chik-fil-A's decision to go antibiotic-free engage in a passive-aggressive attempt to tell a company how to bake bread?
Don't get me wrong: Vani The Food Babe seems like a lovely person. She may use hyperbole and a lot of exclamation points, but she clearly cares deeply about what's in our food. And admittedly, the yoga mat idea is utter genius. That said, however, if you carefully analyze the rhetoric she uses--and the logic she doesn't--it is impossible to distinguish her fear-mongering posts from my parody post on the dangers of coffee. Try it. Read her articles on azodicarbonamide and then read A Cup of Morning Death? and see if you can identify any difference in the caliber of argument.
But what this brings us back to is how it is all too easy to worry about all the wrong things. Penn State food science professor John Coupland framed the issue quite well on his blog:
"[F]ood companies are desperate to appeal to consumer demand and as this case shows they can and will change fast. Campaign smartly though. This campaign was successful not because of a serious consideration of risk but because of the jarring incongruity of a compound being in bread and in plastic. Lots of compounds crop up in lots of places and this is a weak argument for deciding which uses are appropriate. It is I suppose possible that there will be a public health benefit from eliminating this ingredient but not much actual evidence."
As with all "chemicals" it's the dose that makes the toxin. Hey, even dihydrogen monoxide* is fatal if inhaled or consumed to excess.
Look, I can't quantify the potential hazards of Subway's 9-Grain Wheat. Nor can people with far more expertise. But I'd guess with a great degree of confidence that I expose myself to much more risk by driving to my local Subway than by eating their bread.
Bottom line: life has never been safer, yet inexplicably, we're more fearful than ever.
Readers, what do you think?
* Otherwise known as water.
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
Easy. Do all your shopping at Amazon.com via the links on this site! You can also link to me or subscribe to my RSS feed. Finally, consider sharing this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to Facebook, Twitter (follow me @danielckoontz!) or to bookmarking sites like reddit, digg or stumbleupon. I'm deeply grateful to my readers for their ongoing support.
You read that right: yoga mats.
This isn't the first time Food Babe criticized Subway, but it's the first time she got serious traction doing so. Back in 2012, she wrote Is Subway Real Food?, a discouragingly unscientific critique of the preservatives and food additives Subway uses to prevent food spoilage. Then, in late 2013, she wrote her first post about azodicarbonamide where she appears to confuse industrial-scale use of the compound with food-grade uses. However, it wasn't until she created her Subway petition two weeks ago, with the exquisite slogan we want to really eat fresh, not yoga mat--that this issue caught fire.
Let's set aside for the moment the phobia that drives otherwise reasonably intelligent people to fear any chemical with more than four syllables. Instead, let's ask: is this controversy on azodicarbonamide a real controversy?
Unfortunately, this is the wrong question. If enough people think a controversy is real, it becomes real.
Subway must protect its brand, so it will replace the ingredient to avoid losing business. Simple. Management just had to decide at what point the issue became serious enough to justify the change. Whether azodicarbonamide is safe or not is irrelevant.
Of course there's another issue here: why would a food blogger who would fit right in with early 1900's muckrakers, who fancies herself the leader of an army, and who even implausibly takes credit for Chik-fil-A's decision to go antibiotic-free engage in a passive-aggressive attempt to tell a company how to bake bread?
Don't get me wrong: Vani The Food Babe seems like a lovely person. She may use hyperbole and a lot of exclamation points, but she clearly cares deeply about what's in our food. And admittedly, the yoga mat idea is utter genius. That said, however, if you carefully analyze the rhetoric she uses--and the logic she doesn't--it is impossible to distinguish her fear-mongering posts from my parody post on the dangers of coffee. Try it. Read her articles on azodicarbonamide and then read A Cup of Morning Death? and see if you can identify any difference in the caliber of argument.
But what this brings us back to is how it is all too easy to worry about all the wrong things. Penn State food science professor John Coupland framed the issue quite well on his blog:
"[F]ood companies are desperate to appeal to consumer demand and as this case shows they can and will change fast. Campaign smartly though. This campaign was successful not because of a serious consideration of risk but because of the jarring incongruity of a compound being in bread and in plastic. Lots of compounds crop up in lots of places and this is a weak argument for deciding which uses are appropriate. It is I suppose possible that there will be a public health benefit from eliminating this ingredient but not much actual evidence."
As with all "chemicals" it's the dose that makes the toxin. Hey, even dihydrogen monoxide* is fatal if inhaled or consumed to excess.
Look, I can't quantify the potential hazards of Subway's 9-Grain Wheat. Nor can people with far more expertise. But I'd guess with a great degree of confidence that I expose myself to much more risk by driving to my local Subway than by eating their bread.
Bottom line: life has never been safer, yet inexplicably, we're more fearful than ever.
Readers, what do you think?
* Otherwise known as water.
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
Easy. Do all your shopping at Amazon.com
via the links on this site! You can also link to me or subscribe to my RSS feed. Finally, consider sharing this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to Facebook, Twitter (follow me @danielckoontz!) or to bookmarking sites like reddit, digg or stumbleupon. I'm deeply grateful to my readers for their ongoing support.
Could Toxins Be Good For You?
In the 1980s, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) commissioned a study on the health impacts of sustained radiation exposure. They compared two groups of nuclear shipyard workers from Baltimore who had similar jobs except for a single key difference: one group was exposed to very low levels of radiation from the materials they handled, and the other was not. The DOE tracked the workers between 1980 and 1988, and what they found shocked everyone involved.
Radiation made them healthier. The twenty-eight thousand workers exposed to radiation had a 24 percent lower mortality rate than their thirty-two thousand counterparts who were not exposed to radiation. Somehow the toxins that everyone assumed and feared were ruining the workers' health were doing just the opposite.
--from Dr. John J. Ratey's book Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain
Wait, what? Radiation made them healthier?
If nothing else, this shocking anecdote illustrates the complex and counterintuitive biological process of stress and recovery. Who'd guess that nuclear radiation could be good for you?
The answer of course is--duh--radiation isn't good for you. But the central concept here is that we become stronger and healthier thanks to our bodies' reactions to low levels of toxins.
So can we take this concept and apply it to the food we eat? Let's see what Dr. Ratey has to say:
An enormous industry has sprung up to promote the cancer-fighting properties of foods and products that contain antioxidants. Eat more antioxidant-rich broccoli, the logic goes, and you'll live a longer and healthier life. True, perhaps, but not for the reasons the marketing folks would have you believe.
It turns out that these foods are particularly beneficial not only because they contain antioxidants but also because they contain toxins. "Many of the beneficial chemicals in plants--vegetables and fruits--have evolved as toxins to dissuade insects and other animals from eating them... what they're doing is inducing a mild, adaptive stress response in the cells. For example, in broccoli, there's a chemical called sulforaphane, and it clearly activates stress response pathways in cells that upregulate antioxidant enzymes. Broccoli has antioxidants, but at the level you could get from your diet, they're not going to function as antioxidants.
Just as with the nuclear shipyard workers, a mild toxin generates an adaptive stress response that bolsters cells.
Now don't get me wrong: nobody is telling you to drink Roundup or start playing with plutonium rods. But it does make you rethink what it means to be "exposed" to toxins, doesn't it?
Readers, what are your thoughts? I want to know.
Related Posts:
The Problem with Government Food Safety Regulation
Review: The End of Overeating by David Kessler
Recommended Reading for A Good Wine Education
Review: Cooking Green by Kate Heyhoe
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
For those readers interested in supporting Casual Kitchen, the easiest way is to do so is to do all your shopping at Amazon.com via the links on this site. You can also link to me or subscribe to my RSS feed. Finally, consider sharing this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to Facebook, Twitter (follow me @danielckoontz!) or to bookmarking sites like reddit, digg or stumbleupon. I'm deeply grateful to my readers for their ongoing support.
Radiation made them healthier. The twenty-eight thousand workers exposed to radiation had a 24 percent lower mortality rate than their thirty-two thousand counterparts who were not exposed to radiation. Somehow the toxins that everyone assumed and feared were ruining the workers' health were doing just the opposite.
--from Dr. John J. Ratey's book Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain
Wait, what? Radiation made them healthier?
If nothing else, this shocking anecdote illustrates the complex and counterintuitive biological process of stress and recovery. Who'd guess that nuclear radiation could be good for you?
The answer of course is--duh--radiation isn't good for you. But the central concept here is that we become stronger and healthier thanks to our bodies' reactions to low levels of toxins.
So can we take this concept and apply it to the food we eat? Let's see what Dr. Ratey has to say:
An enormous industry has sprung up to promote the cancer-fighting properties of foods and products that contain antioxidants. Eat more antioxidant-rich broccoli, the logic goes, and you'll live a longer and healthier life. True, perhaps, but not for the reasons the marketing folks would have you believe.
It turns out that these foods are particularly beneficial not only because they contain antioxidants but also because they contain toxins. "Many of the beneficial chemicals in plants--vegetables and fruits--have evolved as toxins to dissuade insects and other animals from eating them... what they're doing is inducing a mild, adaptive stress response in the cells. For example, in broccoli, there's a chemical called sulforaphane, and it clearly activates stress response pathways in cells that upregulate antioxidant enzymes. Broccoli has antioxidants, but at the level you could get from your diet, they're not going to function as antioxidants.
Just as with the nuclear shipyard workers, a mild toxin generates an adaptive stress response that bolsters cells.
Now don't get me wrong: nobody is telling you to drink Roundup or start playing with plutonium rods. But it does make you rethink what it means to be "exposed" to toxins, doesn't it?
Readers, what are your thoughts? I want to know.
Related Posts:
The Problem with Government Food Safety Regulation
Review: The End of Overeating by David Kessler
Recommended Reading for A Good Wine Education
Review: Cooking Green by Kate Heyhoe
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
For those readers interested in supporting Casual Kitchen, the easiest way is to do so is to do all your shopping at Amazon.com
via the links on this site. You can also link to me or subscribe to my RSS feed. Finally, consider sharing this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to Facebook, Twitter (follow me @danielckoontz!) or to bookmarking sites like reddit, digg or stumbleupon. I'm deeply grateful to my readers for their ongoing support.
Who's Watching the Watchdogs? Ethical Problems in the "Ten Riskiest Foods" Report By the CSPI
Here's where I correct an example of raging intellectual dishonesty from a well-meaning food safety watchdog group.
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Anyone listening to the news over the past day or two has probably heard a news blurb or two on a highly critical report about the dangers of eating 10 surprisingly risky foods.
This report was written by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer watchdog group that has done an amazing job putting together a report that's both controversial and highly disturbing. And most importantly, the report is easy for reporters to work into an attention-grabbing story.
Too bad it's an utter non-story.
In today's post I'm going to discuss exactly why it's a non-story, and I'm going to raise questions about the ethics of manufacturing an apparent health scare in order to draw attention to a watchdog organization's agenda.
First, the report itself, which lists ten surprising foods already regulated by the FDA that led to more than 48,000 cases of food-borne illness. These foods, in order, are:
1) LEAFY GREENS: 13,568 reported cases of illness
2) EGGS: 11,163 reported cases of illness
3) TUNA: 2341 reported cases of illness
4) OYSTERS: 3409 reported cases of illness
5) POTATOES: 3659 reported cases of illness
6) CHEESE: 2761 reported cases of illness
7) ICE CREAM: 2594 reported cases of illness
8) TOMATOES: 3292 reported cases of illness
9) SPROUTS: 2022 reported cases of illness
10) BERRIES: 3397 reported cases of illness
All told, these ten foods accounted for a total of 48,206 cases of illness (the report gives no fatality information, but I would guess less than 1% of these resulted in deaths). The press release goes on to drop this exceptionally well-chosen money quote from CSPI staff attorney Sarah Klein:
"It is clearly time for FDA's reliance on industry self-regulation to come to an end. The absence of safety plans or frequent inspections unfortunately means that some of our favorite and most healthful foods also top the list of the most risky."
Pretty compelling stuff, huh?
We don't find out until the very end of the report, however, that these are the sum total of food-borne illnesses reported over a 17 year period from 1990 to 2006. That means that on a per year basis, there are approximately 2,835 illnesses per year.
And that, unfortunately, ruins everything.
Let me explain by putting these numbers in perspective. The USA has a population of more than 300 million. 2,835 people are sickened by these ten foods each year. That means that your odds of getting sick on these foods are roughly, 1 in 105,820 per year (or, expressed in percentage form, it works out to less than 1 one thousandth of one percent). The odds of dying? Probably well less than one in a million.
I will take those odds any day. Please pass the spinach and eggs.
Even if you swallow the CSPI's assertion that the list above represents only 40% of reported illnesses (thus the total could be 7089/year), we're talking about an illness rate of 2.4 thousandths of one percent.
Now I very much feel for anyone who's suffered from food poisoning, but anybody with a calculator can tell that this is not only not a health crisis, it is not even a rounding error. Compare the above data to the real health crisis of highway deaths, which run between 38,000 and 41,000 per year. Yes, that's right, per year. (And these are highway deaths, not highway "illnesses.") Now that is a legitimate health crisis, but somehow it doesn't seem to resonate quite the same way as dying from a pint of ice cream.
Here's why reports like this infuriate me, and why they should infuriate you too. People are going to avoid healthy foods because of this report. They are going to worry unnecessarily after hearing about this report. Worst of all, they are going to worry about the wrong things. I'm sure the CSPI means well, but they've written a report that actually hurts the public.
But it certainly doesn't hurt the CSPI. In fact, this report helps the CSPI gain attention and grow in scope and stature. Which brings me to my next point. Why do reports like this get written, and why is it that they are quickly picked up and widely disseminated by the mass media?
Because they are constructed specifically for that purpose. What talk radio show or news program isn't going to run with a story about food borne illness from foods like lettuce that are otherwise thought to be healthy? And along with lots of free media attention, the CSPI gets the warm patina of being an altruistic organization out to fight for healthy food. After all, "fighting for healthy food" is kind of like rooting for puppies, isn't it?
Now, what if I were to ask: what is the purpose of a watchdog/advocacy group like the CSPI? You might logically answer, "oh, well of course, they care about our food supply."
You'd be wrong. That's the CSPI's secondary purpose. Their primary purpose is to get noticed and thereby secure contributions, donations and support. And judging by this latest flurry of news coverage on their latest report, I'd argue that they are very good at that. The question is, at what cost, and with what unintended consequences?
If the CSPI mis-informs the public about a health crisis that isn't, and as a result causes us to expend resources, tax dollars and political energy on areas that do not need that attention, then the CSPI's ends do not justify their means. This, in a nutshell, is exactly what's wrong with our media and many of our watchdog and lobbying groups.
Therefore, in the future, when you see a news story on the food industry that sounds particularly horrifying, do two things. Listen with a jaundiced ear, and note what organization wrote it. If it's the CSPI, keep today's article in mind.
Readers, what do you think? Is it ethical for advocacy groups to bend and massage the truth to gain attention for their cause--even if it's ostensibly a good cause?
Sources:
CSPI's own press release on the report
The full CSPI report itself
Other media outlets that gullibly picked up the story:
Pittsburgh Post Gazette: Calls grow for tougher food safety regulations
New York Times: Ten Common Food Poisoning Risks
ABC News: Where's the Beef? 10 Unexpectedly Risky Foods
A follow up article from the blog of Sarah Klein, a CSPI staff attorney and the report's lead author:
Are we all crash test dummies for the food industry?
Understandably angry responses from food industry sites:
Media Should Treat CSPI Report With Skepticism
An Outbreak of Distortion
Related Posts:
Stacked Costs and Second-Order Foods: A New Way to Think About Rising Food Costs
How to Give Away Your Power By Being a Biased Consumer
Brand Disloyalty
41 Ways You Can Help the Environment From Your Kitchen
A Recession-Proof Guide to Saving Money on Food
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
If you enjoy reading Casual Kitchen, tell a friend and spread the word! You can also support me by purchasing items from Amazon.com via links on this site, or by linking to me or subscribing to my RSS feed. Finally, you can consider submitting this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to bookmarking sites like del.icio.us, digg or stumbleupon. Thank you for your support!
**************************************************
Anyone listening to the news over the past day or two has probably heard a news blurb or two on a highly critical report about the dangers of eating 10 surprisingly risky foods.
This report was written by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer watchdog group that has done an amazing job putting together a report that's both controversial and highly disturbing. And most importantly, the report is easy for reporters to work into an attention-grabbing story.
Too bad it's an utter non-story.
In today's post I'm going to discuss exactly why it's a non-story, and I'm going to raise questions about the ethics of manufacturing an apparent health scare in order to draw attention to a watchdog organization's agenda.
First, the report itself, which lists ten surprising foods already regulated by the FDA that led to more than 48,000 cases of food-borne illness. These foods, in order, are:
1) LEAFY GREENS: 13,568 reported cases of illness
2) EGGS: 11,163 reported cases of illness
3) TUNA: 2341 reported cases of illness
4) OYSTERS: 3409 reported cases of illness
5) POTATOES: 3659 reported cases of illness
6) CHEESE: 2761 reported cases of illness
7) ICE CREAM: 2594 reported cases of illness
8) TOMATOES: 3292 reported cases of illness
9) SPROUTS: 2022 reported cases of illness
10) BERRIES: 3397 reported cases of illness
All told, these ten foods accounted for a total of 48,206 cases of illness (the report gives no fatality information, but I would guess less than 1% of these resulted in deaths). The press release goes on to drop this exceptionally well-chosen money quote from CSPI staff attorney Sarah Klein:
"It is clearly time for FDA's reliance on industry self-regulation to come to an end. The absence of safety plans or frequent inspections unfortunately means that some of our favorite and most healthful foods also top the list of the most risky."
Pretty compelling stuff, huh?
We don't find out until the very end of the report, however, that these are the sum total of food-borne illnesses reported over a 17 year period from 1990 to 2006. That means that on a per year basis, there are approximately 2,835 illnesses per year.
And that, unfortunately, ruins everything.
Let me explain by putting these numbers in perspective. The USA has a population of more than 300 million. 2,835 people are sickened by these ten foods each year. That means that your odds of getting sick on these foods are roughly, 1 in 105,820 per year (or, expressed in percentage form, it works out to less than 1 one thousandth of one percent). The odds of dying? Probably well less than one in a million.
I will take those odds any day. Please pass the spinach and eggs.
Even if you swallow the CSPI's assertion that the list above represents only 40% of reported illnesses (thus the total could be 7089/year), we're talking about an illness rate of 2.4 thousandths of one percent.
Now I very much feel for anyone who's suffered from food poisoning, but anybody with a calculator can tell that this is not only not a health crisis, it is not even a rounding error. Compare the above data to the real health crisis of highway deaths, which run between 38,000 and 41,000 per year. Yes, that's right, per year. (And these are highway deaths, not highway "illnesses.") Now that is a legitimate health crisis, but somehow it doesn't seem to resonate quite the same way as dying from a pint of ice cream.
Here's why reports like this infuriate me, and why they should infuriate you too. People are going to avoid healthy foods because of this report. They are going to worry unnecessarily after hearing about this report. Worst of all, they are going to worry about the wrong things. I'm sure the CSPI means well, but they've written a report that actually hurts the public.
But it certainly doesn't hurt the CSPI. In fact, this report helps the CSPI gain attention and grow in scope and stature. Which brings me to my next point. Why do reports like this get written, and why is it that they are quickly picked up and widely disseminated by the mass media?
Because they are constructed specifically for that purpose. What talk radio show or news program isn't going to run with a story about food borne illness from foods like lettuce that are otherwise thought to be healthy? And along with lots of free media attention, the CSPI gets the warm patina of being an altruistic organization out to fight for healthy food. After all, "fighting for healthy food" is kind of like rooting for puppies, isn't it?
Now, what if I were to ask: what is the purpose of a watchdog/advocacy group like the CSPI? You might logically answer, "oh, well of course, they care about our food supply."
You'd be wrong. That's the CSPI's secondary purpose. Their primary purpose is to get noticed and thereby secure contributions, donations and support. And judging by this latest flurry of news coverage on their latest report, I'd argue that they are very good at that. The question is, at what cost, and with what unintended consequences?
If the CSPI mis-informs the public about a health crisis that isn't, and as a result causes us to expend resources, tax dollars and political energy on areas that do not need that attention, then the CSPI's ends do not justify their means. This, in a nutshell, is exactly what's wrong with our media and many of our watchdog and lobbying groups.
Therefore, in the future, when you see a news story on the food industry that sounds particularly horrifying, do two things. Listen with a jaundiced ear, and note what organization wrote it. If it's the CSPI, keep today's article in mind.
Readers, what do you think? Is it ethical for advocacy groups to bend and massage the truth to gain attention for their cause--even if it's ostensibly a good cause?
Sources:
CSPI's own press release on the report
The full CSPI report itself
Other media outlets that gullibly picked up the story:
Pittsburgh Post Gazette: Calls grow for tougher food safety regulations
New York Times: Ten Common Food Poisoning Risks
ABC News: Where's the Beef? 10 Unexpectedly Risky Foods
A follow up article from the blog of Sarah Klein, a CSPI staff attorney and the report's lead author:
Are we all crash test dummies for the food industry?
Understandably angry responses from food industry sites:
Media Should Treat CSPI Report With Skepticism
An Outbreak of Distortion
Related Posts:
Stacked Costs and Second-Order Foods: A New Way to Think About Rising Food Costs
How to Give Away Your Power By Being a Biased Consumer
Brand Disloyalty
41 Ways You Can Help the Environment From Your Kitchen
A Recession-Proof Guide to Saving Money on Food
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
If you enjoy reading Casual Kitchen, tell a friend and spread the word! You can also support me by purchasing items from Amazon.com
via links on this site, or by linking to me or subscribing to my RSS feed. Finally, you can consider submitting this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to bookmarking sites like del.icio.us, digg or stumbleupon. Thank you for your support!
The Problem with Government Food Safety Regulation
We all have a vested interest in making sure that our country's food supply is as safe as it can possibly be.
And we have an enormous and powerful federal regulatory body, the FDA, which regulates food safety in this country. And yet our regulators failed to prevent the recent rash of food contamination problems (raspberries? peanut butter? spinach? jalapenos?) that we've faced here in the USA. In fact, some have even made the argument that our food regulators have lost the confidence of the American people.
How did we get here?
This article will try to frame up some of the issues that come up when the government tries to regulate the food industry and prevent lapses in food safety. As always, I'd love to hear input from my readers, who in my opinion are some of the most insightful out there, so please share your thoughts below in the comments section.
The Lifecycle of a Government Regulator
There's a rhythm to the birth, life (and in rare cases, the death) of a governmental regulatory agency. It all starts when there's enough of a groundswell of popular opinion to regulate a given industry in the first place. And in the food industry in the late 1800s and early 1900s, we got exactly that, as the uproar following a wide range of egregious behavior by food and beverage makers drove the creation of a federal agency to regulate food and drug products (for a textbook expose of nasty food processing practices from that era, see Upton Sinclair's The Jungle).
Once the regulatory body gets established, things typically improve, often markedly. If all goes well, then new standards get set, enforcement procedures get put into place, bad guys get caught and put out of business, and the industry slowly but surely adjusts to improved standards.
Everybody wins during this stage: consumers get safer food, companies that are good actors gain market share as the bad guys leave the business, and the regulators (as well as the politicians who put them into place) get immense political capital for helping the industry improve its standards and practices.
Symbiosis
However, things don't always remain quite so perfect. Often the regulatory agency and the industry it regulates begin to develop a symbiosis that hampers the agency's ability to objectively regulate the very industry it was created for.
One of the key sources of this symbiosis comes from the fact that the regulator and the industry typically hire from the same talent pool. The regulators need people with industry knowledge so they can put reasonable regulations into place. Likewise, the industry needs people with regulatory knowledge so they can competently follow the regulations.
Often, a great way to enter the food or drug industry and secure a high-paying job is to first spend a few years working for government pay at the FDA. And what better way is there to show the world that your company is carefully following federal regulations than to hire a key regulator as a senior person in your company?
For better or for worse, a symbiotic--some might say a parasitic--relationship gradually begins between the regulator and the industry it regulates. They hire the same people, they all know each other, and in some instances, they gradually grow to need each other.
In a worst-case scenario, the regulatory agency gets bigger and bigger, gets staffed with more and more people from the industry, and slowly but surely, the organization's mandate begins to change from regulating to feeding its own budget and bureaucracy. We've just seen a classic example of this worst kind of symbiosis in my former profession, as the SEC and other regulatory bureaucracies utterly failed in their mandate to regulate the securities industry, despite having enormous staffs and huge budgets.
Throw Money at the Problem
Ironically, whenever a big problem slips by the regulators, say a peanut butter recall or e. coli contamination at a large beef processing plant, the initial reaction is often to increase the budget for the regulatory agency. This gives rise to a powerful, if counterintuitive, irony: the regulatory agency actually benefits by failing to do its job!
Political Grandstanding
Any of you who have watched a Senate hearing on TV will agree that our congressional leaders, from both parties, just love to grandstand. Whenever there's a hearing broadcast on CNN, whether it's about food safety, steroids in baseball or overpaid Wall Street executives, believe me, every congressperson sitting in on those hearings wants to make the most of their three minutes of speaking time on national TV.
This happens in print media too: witness this zinger of a quote at the end of a New York Times article on food safety where Michigan Representative John Dingell says, “as a result of the failure of giving Food and Drug the resources it needs, people are dying.” Is that a constructive comment, or is it needlessly inflammatory? The FDA already has an enormous budget--will giving it still more money really help it become a more effective regulatory body?
I guess it depends on your perspective. The thing is, there is just too much political capital to be earned in situations like this for our legislators to resist dropping inflammatory quotes like this. Of course, it is another matter entirely whether this actually helps solve the issue at hand.
In no way am I making the argument that we should eliminate regulation, nor do I claim regulators are universally incompetent. In fact, if there's any conclusion to be made from the recent rash of food contamination problems we've had in the US, we need more and better regulation.
My goal for this post is to illustrate some of the common issues and problems that emerge when our government tries to regulate something as enormous and as complex as our country's food industry. Many of the issues I've discussed are predictable and they've happened in many other industries over the course of our nation's history.
What You Can Do To Help
Most importantly, you can help by being watchful and involved citizens and voters. The next time there's a major food or drug recall, watch out for the political grandstanding. Watch the ensuing budget process and see where your tax dollars go. Observe the media with a critical eye, and note which of your congressional leaders are more interested in appearing to help solve the problem (while getting maximum media airtime, naturally), and which of your leaders are actually interested in solving the problem. And if you see your congressman or senator being a demagogue or playing games with public opinion, call them or write them and make sure they know you are watching. And voting.
Readers, what are your thoughts?
A big thank you to Accidental Hedonist for writing a series of articles on this subject and prompting me to think about these issues!
For Further Reading:
The Jungle
by Upton Sinclair: This book, published in 1906, was famous for exposing horrendous food safety practices in the meat processing industry. Its publication was one of the key forces behind the passage of the 1906 Food and Drug Act.
The 1906 Food and Drug Act and the History of the FDA From the FDA's own website.
FDA Finalizes Report on 2006 Spinach Outbreak You can see your tax dollars at work right here in this report. I think.
Related Posts:
A Recession-Proof Guide to Saving Money on Food
Stacked Costs and Second-Order Foods: A New Way to Think About Rising Food Costs
41 Ways You Can Help the Environment From Your Kitchen
How to Live Forever in Ten Easy Steps
A Rebuttal of "The Last Bite"
How to Handle Raw Chicken So That You'll NEVER Get Food Poisoning
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
If you enjoy reading Casual Kitchen, tell a friend and spread the word! You can also support me by linking to me, subscribing to my RSS feed, or submitting this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to bookmarking sites like del.icio.us, digg or stumbleupon.
And we have an enormous and powerful federal regulatory body, the FDA, which regulates food safety in this country. And yet our regulators failed to prevent the recent rash of food contamination problems (raspberries? peanut butter? spinach? jalapenos?) that we've faced here in the USA. In fact, some have even made the argument that our food regulators have lost the confidence of the American people.
How did we get here?
This article will try to frame up some of the issues that come up when the government tries to regulate the food industry and prevent lapses in food safety. As always, I'd love to hear input from my readers, who in my opinion are some of the most insightful out there, so please share your thoughts below in the comments section.
The Lifecycle of a Government Regulator
There's a rhythm to the birth, life (and in rare cases, the death) of a governmental regulatory agency. It all starts when there's enough of a groundswell of popular opinion to regulate a given industry in the first place. And in the food industry in the late 1800s and early 1900s, we got exactly that, as the uproar following a wide range of egregious behavior by food and beverage makers drove the creation of a federal agency to regulate food and drug products (for a textbook expose of nasty food processing practices from that era, see Upton Sinclair's The Jungle).
Once the regulatory body gets established, things typically improve, often markedly. If all goes well, then new standards get set, enforcement procedures get put into place, bad guys get caught and put out of business, and the industry slowly but surely adjusts to improved standards.
Everybody wins during this stage: consumers get safer food, companies that are good actors gain market share as the bad guys leave the business, and the regulators (as well as the politicians who put them into place) get immense political capital for helping the industry improve its standards and practices.
Symbiosis
However, things don't always remain quite so perfect. Often the regulatory agency and the industry it regulates begin to develop a symbiosis that hampers the agency's ability to objectively regulate the very industry it was created for.
One of the key sources of this symbiosis comes from the fact that the regulator and the industry typically hire from the same talent pool. The regulators need people with industry knowledge so they can put reasonable regulations into place. Likewise, the industry needs people with regulatory knowledge so they can competently follow the regulations.
Often, a great way to enter the food or drug industry and secure a high-paying job is to first spend a few years working for government pay at the FDA. And what better way is there to show the world that your company is carefully following federal regulations than to hire a key regulator as a senior person in your company?
For better or for worse, a symbiotic--some might say a parasitic--relationship gradually begins between the regulator and the industry it regulates. They hire the same people, they all know each other, and in some instances, they gradually grow to need each other.
In a worst-case scenario, the regulatory agency gets bigger and bigger, gets staffed with more and more people from the industry, and slowly but surely, the organization's mandate begins to change from regulating to feeding its own budget and bureaucracy. We've just seen a classic example of this worst kind of symbiosis in my former profession, as the SEC and other regulatory bureaucracies utterly failed in their mandate to regulate the securities industry, despite having enormous staffs and huge budgets.
Throw Money at the Problem
Ironically, whenever a big problem slips by the regulators, say a peanut butter recall or e. coli contamination at a large beef processing plant, the initial reaction is often to increase the budget for the regulatory agency. This gives rise to a powerful, if counterintuitive, irony: the regulatory agency actually benefits by failing to do its job!
Political Grandstanding
Any of you who have watched a Senate hearing on TV will agree that our congressional leaders, from both parties, just love to grandstand. Whenever there's a hearing broadcast on CNN, whether it's about food safety, steroids in baseball or overpaid Wall Street executives, believe me, every congressperson sitting in on those hearings wants to make the most of their three minutes of speaking time on national TV.
This happens in print media too: witness this zinger of a quote at the end of a New York Times article on food safety where Michigan Representative John Dingell says, “as a result of the failure of giving Food and Drug the resources it needs, people are dying.” Is that a constructive comment, or is it needlessly inflammatory? The FDA already has an enormous budget--will giving it still more money really help it become a more effective regulatory body?
I guess it depends on your perspective. The thing is, there is just too much political capital to be earned in situations like this for our legislators to resist dropping inflammatory quotes like this. Of course, it is another matter entirely whether this actually helps solve the issue at hand.
In no way am I making the argument that we should eliminate regulation, nor do I claim regulators are universally incompetent. In fact, if there's any conclusion to be made from the recent rash of food contamination problems we've had in the US, we need more and better regulation.
My goal for this post is to illustrate some of the common issues and problems that emerge when our government tries to regulate something as enormous and as complex as our country's food industry. Many of the issues I've discussed are predictable and they've happened in many other industries over the course of our nation's history.
What You Can Do To Help
Most importantly, you can help by being watchful and involved citizens and voters. The next time there's a major food or drug recall, watch out for the political grandstanding. Watch the ensuing budget process and see where your tax dollars go. Observe the media with a critical eye, and note which of your congressional leaders are more interested in appearing to help solve the problem (while getting maximum media airtime, naturally), and which of your leaders are actually interested in solving the problem. And if you see your congressman or senator being a demagogue or playing games with public opinion, call them or write them and make sure they know you are watching. And voting.
Readers, what are your thoughts?
A big thank you to Accidental Hedonist for writing a series of articles on this subject and prompting me to think about these issues!
For Further Reading:
The Jungle
by Upton Sinclair: This book, published in 1906, was famous for exposing horrendous food safety practices in the meat processing industry. Its publication was one of the key forces behind the passage of the 1906 Food and Drug Act.The 1906 Food and Drug Act and the History of the FDA From the FDA's own website.
FDA Finalizes Report on 2006 Spinach Outbreak You can see your tax dollars at work right here in this report. I think.
Related Posts:
A Recession-Proof Guide to Saving Money on Food
Stacked Costs and Second-Order Foods: A New Way to Think About Rising Food Costs
41 Ways You Can Help the Environment From Your Kitchen
How to Live Forever in Ten Easy Steps
A Rebuttal of "The Last Bite"
How to Handle Raw Chicken So That You'll NEVER Get Food Poisoning
How can I support Casual Kitchen?
If you enjoy reading Casual Kitchen, tell a friend and spread the word! You can also support me by linking to me, subscribing to my RSS feed, or submitting this article, or any other article you particularly enjoyed here, to bookmarking sites like del.icio.us, digg or stumbleupon.
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