Imagine cutting a delicious salad for lunch filled with good-for-you leafy greens and topped with raw veggies like shredded tomatoes and carrots. So healthy, right? You feel good and pat yourself on the back for your food choices. But what if we told you that your healthy lunch has the potential to contain real animal feces that can cause foodborne illness? That salad probably looks less appealing and more of a high-risk option.
“The main way you’ll get sick of your food today it’s from your salad, leafy greens and any fruits and vegetables you eat raw and uncooked,” said Scott Faber, senior vice president of government affairs for the Environmental Working Group. “The main way that pathogens get into these foods is through irrigation water. [used on farms] which is full of animal feces”.
That’s right, animal feces. Poop. So what are the chances that your lunch contains poop particles?
First, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 1 in 6 Americans (approximately 48 million people) gets a foodborne illness each year. Foodborne illnesses (also known as food poisoning) occur because dangerous and sometimes deadly strains of bacteria, such as E. coli, Listeria, Salmonella, and others, hide in certain foods. Of the estimated number of people who get sick each year, 128,000 are hospitalized while 3,000 people die. And those are just rough numbers.
While you can get foodborne illnesses from contaminated animal proteins like chicken and beef, eggs, milk, and cheese, raw produce is the culprit almost 50% of the time. According to the Centers for Disease Control and PreventionLeafy greens like romaine lettuce and spinach are often the worst offender among the raw vegetables out there and are a major source of E. coli contamination. It seems the headlines have been plagued with remember in several batches of spinach or Romaine lettuce in recent years.
“It used to be that you could wash your vegetables three times and get [pathogens] off, but now it’s growing toward the roots from the water below,” said Jaydee Hanson, policy director for the Center for Food Safety. Though extreme, she said she feels she should warn people to “cook their lettuce” before eating that.
and don’t get lost One in four people contaminate their food when cooking with this ingredient, a new study shows.
The contamination process.
When you have a produce farm next to an animal farm (chickens, cows, pigs, etc.), there is a lot more poop around, increasing the risk of your irrigation water becoming contaminated. And, if you’re thinking that farmers using manure to fertilize plants means poop on produce can’t be that big of a deal, think again.
According to Brian Ronholm, director of food policy at Consumer Reports, who used to work for the Department of Agriculture under the Obama administration, the manure composting process involves the application of heat, which kills many pathogens.
And fortunately, there are restrictions, such as raw manure cannot be used as fertilizer within 120 days of harvest. “The problem … is that raw manure flows from nearby feedlots and ends up directly in the field or pathogens end up in agriculture. [agricultural] water and are applied directly in the field”.
The poop escape
More than a decade ago, Congress passed the Food Safety Moderation Act to help protect Americans from foodborne illness. The FDA has worked to implement all the regulations stipulated by law. However, one area that has not been fully addressed 11 years later is the safety of agricultural water used for agricultural products. The agency proposed some standards in 2015, but many food safety and consumer advocates said they fell short.
“The FDA was supposed to set standards for how much poop can be in your irrigation water and sprinkled on your lunch,” Faber said. “After being under extraordinary pressure from farmers, it is now completely up to the farmers how much poop you can include in your lunch.”
The testing problem
The problem has to do with testing. Findings published through a month-long investigation by politician revealed that if a farmer uses a microbial test on a water sample in the morning and it comes out clean, that does not mean that a sample of that same water at night or the next day will also be clean because agricultural water is constantly changing.
There are environmental factors to consider. Ronholm said birds, wildlife, wind and more can also increase levels of contaminated feces in production fields.
“We’re finding that testing levels don’t correlate with water safety,” said Dr. James Kincheloe, food safety campaign manager for the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI).
Ronholm said another problem is that the FDA does not have jurisdiction to inspect animal feeding operations for pathogens. He believes there is a need for legislation giving the FDA the power to conduct these inspections.
The FDA proposed a new set of guidelines for agricultural water in December 2021 under the product safety rule. According to an FDA spokesperson, the agency has since held two public meetings and several webinars to explain the proposal and solicit comments from interested parties (the comment deadline was April).
“We are committed to working diligently to consider the comments,” the spokesperson said. “The proposed rule is thorough and is based on scientific developments and lessons learned from recent produce outbreak investigations (particularly with respect to issues stemming from adjacent and nearby land). The agency believes that, if finalized, it will help double the foodborne illness curve and will provide benefits for generations to come.
Some feel the new guidelines are still too flexible. “Consumers they don’t always have the best food safety practices in their kitchen. I go into this thinking they don’t, so I want to make sure any food that comes into your kitchen is safe,” Kincheloe said of why he and others are fighting for strict guidelines. In his opinion, “the guidelines should say that these are the standards that everyone must meet.”
How to protect yourself
First, don’t panic. Eating green leafy vegetables It has tremendous health benefits. While there are some cases of foodborne illness from contaminated produce, it is by no means an epidemic.
However, until stricter guidelines are put in place, there are some things you can do to protect yourself.
- Practice safe food handling and preparation. The FDA suggests washing your hands with soap and warm water for at least 20 seconds before and after handling raw food.
- Weigh the risks and identify the riskiest. Ronholm said romaine lettuce tends to be the riskiest of the leafy greens simply because its rough texture makes it easier for pathogens to stick to it. That doesn’t mean you should avoid romaine lettuce, just make sure you wash it well before eating it.
- Ask your local farmers. Danielle Melgar, food and agriculture advocate for PIRG, said local farmers know if they are near animal husbandry operations and feedlots. So if you find yourself at a farmers market, feel free to ask the growers about their growing conditions and choose accordingly.
- Consider indoor growers. “In traditional agriculture, water is often not tested before it is used to irrigate crops, which means it could contain contaminants, such as pesticides or animal manure, from outside sources and pose a threat to public health,” the attorney general said. Bowery Farming, Christopher Livingston. declared in a recently published report. “Indoor growers, like Bowery, typically use filtered municipal water and then further ensure cleanliness by regularly testing their irrigation water for contaminants and using reverse osmosis to further clean the water.”
- Grow your own food on a balcony or roof, in your backyard or in a community garden. Melgar said if he’s growing his own food, he’ll be aware of other contaminants like lead in the pipes in his building that carry water to the garden hose. “It’s a balance,” he said.
- Wash green leafy vegetables even when they have been “pre-washed.” Brian referred to a consumer reports study in which they determined there was no difference in bacteria levels between whole head and three-washed packaged romaine lettuce. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention“The best way to wash leafy greens is to rinse them under running water. Studies show that this step removes some of the germs and dirt from leafy greens and other vegetables and fruits. But no washing method can remove all the germs.
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