From March to August, I’ve had a recurring issue with salmonella outbreaks. This time we’ve had it around the time of my family’s holiday weekend away. I’ve had the entire group of us eating at home for dinner, including the kids, and still that morning, I woke up to find I had a very nasty cold and was coughing up blood.
For a while, I thought I might have salmonella poisoning. I thought it was because of all of the food that my wife and I had been eating, but then I realized that we had had the food for a few days. So I checked myself for anything weird and was surprised to find out I had a very strong suspicion of salmonella poisoning.
It’s not that rare. We had a few people come in with salmonella poisoning last year and one of the most common symptoms is diarrhea.
Salmonella is a bacteria that is transmitted primarily through food and water. The bacteria can contaminate raw fruits and vegetables, food that has been stored in close quarters, or food that is simply exposed to contaminated water. This is not a specific illness, but is one that can result in serious complications if untreated. Symptoms vary from mild, to very severe, depending on how quickly the bacteria spreads. Typically, salmonella bacteria are found in eggs, meat, and poultry.
While Salmonella outbreaks are rare occurrences in the U.S., they do happen. According to the Centers for Disease Control, the most recent outbreak was in January 2012 in Kentucky. According to the CDC, in that outbreak, the bacteria was found in eggs that had been stored in a cooler with cooler water.
In an article in the New York Times, the CDC estimates that there have been over 1,000 cases of salmonella in the U.S. between 2000 and 2012. The last serious outbreak was in 1993. The CDC suggests you boil the eggs and store them in the fridge, or if you have a fridge, you should leave the eggs out in the sun until the bacteria dies off.
This is a problem with many frozen foods, but in the case of meat, there is no way of knowing how the bacteria is spread. It’s not enough to boil and refrigerate meat, the bacteria must penetrate the meat and live on it. If a meat cooler had been left out too long, the bacteria could have colonized the meat and killed it before it could be cooked.
Salmonella is a problem that food safety professionals have been dealing with for some time now. While the issue is most common in raw poultry, the bacteria can easily spread to other raw meats, such as ground turkey. In fact, it’s not uncommon to find people who come into restaurants and order ground turkey in a salad, and then come back the next day and find the salad looking like the chef’s face.
Salmonella is just one of many diseases that can be caused by raw meats. One of the most common is E.Coli, a type of E coli that can cause serious illness and death if not treated quickly. It’s not uncommon to find people who are sick for weeks, and then not tell anyone about it because they think they’re all okay. For those who think they’re getting better, think again.
Salmonella is a type of E coli, but is much more prevalent than E coli. It is most commonly found in poultry and egg-laying birds. A recent study found that ground turkey is the most common type of food that causes salmonella outbreaks. The reason for this is that many people, especially those that work in kitchens, cook with raw meat. Salmonella is a disease that can be spread to people through contaminated food.
