Fatal Food

America's public health departments perform erratically when it comes to protecting us from food illnesses.

Some states are magnificent, doing a good job in both detecting and diagnosing the cause of food illnesses.

The best, according to a first-of-its-kind study by Scripps Howard News Service, is the Wisconsin Department of Public Health and Family Services, which finds the cause of 90 percent of food illnesses. Wisconsin also led the nation recently by being the first to detect the E. coli-tainted raw spinach linked to at least three deaths. A quarter of all known cases of spinach poisoning where found in Wisconsin.

Worst in the nation are Alabama and Florida, which diagnoses the cause of food poisoning outbreaks just 5 percent and 12 percent of the time, respectively. Neither state detected any spinach cases.

Other states are nearly blind to the problems. Worst was Kentucky, which over a five year period detected just four outbreaks affecting 35 people. That is an impossibly low number, experts agree. Kentucky medical officials have ordered reforms to their disease reporting system because of the Scripps Howard study.

(Thomas Hargrove is a writer specializing in statistics, polling and computer assisted reporting at Scripps Howard News Service in Washington DC.)

Good articles and the data certainly pointed out that restaurants are a leading cause of reported food poisoning. Is the source of the bacteria/virus more likely to be the food as delivered or the handling of it in the restaurant? I was disappointed that the articles did not identify things people can do to minimize the risk of food poisoning; the role and performance of health departments with respect to restaurants; how the public can identify "risky" restaurants; and the impact of health department ratings (or lack of impact).
It seems that the strictness of health department inspections varies even at a local level. I have also noticed that some states/cities require restaurants to conspicuously post their health department rating. Do these factors have any impact on food poisoning?

There are a host of consumer safety tips at the Webpage "foodsafety.gov" maintained by the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition. Specifically when dining at restaurants, the FDA advises people to observe whether food appears to be clean, thoroughly cooked and maintained at proper temperatures.

--Thomas Hargrove