Another Day, Another Beef Recall

While reading the paper this morning, I came across an article about another beef recall being put into action after two people died and more than a dozen people fell ill, possibly due to the same source of contamination: ground beef from a company called Fairbank Farms.

The voluntary recall, issued on Saturday by the company, includes 545,699 pounds of ground beef sold to retailers in 8 states: Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. Some of the stores at which these products were sold include Price Chopper, Giant, Trader Joe's Wild Harvest, and Shaws.

While I know that cooking can kill a lot of the bacteria, I still get really nervous when I read stuff like this. It seems to be happening way too often. There is a lot that the consumer can do to lower their chances of falling ill, but if you're starting out with a contaminated product, there's not a whole lot you can do.

Since one of the few foods I don't like is ground beef, it's not a huge deal to me, but I know that my dad, for example, practically lives off of the stuff. I feel like when I read about these things, it's easy to feel like "oh, that's just something that happens to other people," but I'm sure that those people who get sick felt the same way.

While I'm not going to try to advocate a restrictive diet in which potentially dangerous foods are cut out (the list is way too long), I will say that events such as huge meat recalls should make people more concerned with knowing where their food comes from.