How Safe is Our Food?

Martin Blaser N Engl J Med 1996;334:1324-1325

Taking advantage of a report in the same issue of the New England Journal of Medicine concerning an outbreak of salmonellosis in ice cream, Martin Blaser attempts to bring mad-cow hysteria to the U.S. Permit me to regale you with choice quotes from his editorial on the safety of our food supply.

Salmonellosis... is a disease of civilization... Salmonellosis is rare in developing countries where sanitation is poor and diarrheal diseases are endemic...

Personally, I prefer civilization and salmonellosis over developing countries and plague, ebola, cholera, malaria, etc., any day.

[I]n the United States, the reported increase of salmonellosis has been increasing over the past 50 years...

Since salmonellosis is a disease of civilization, I guess this follows from becoming more civilized. But I suspect, Martin, that the real reason there's a reported increase in salmonellosis is because NOW THERE'S A SYSTEM FOR REPORTING IT!

New opportunities for foodborne diseases result from the increasing internationalization of our food supply...

Martin must be a holdover from the Pat Buchanan for President campaign. If we build a wall, will foodborne diseases stay out?

The grim implications of [mad-cow disease] for cattle and possibly humans point to the unanticipated problems that can arise from a breach in basic ecologic relations (cows, which are herbivores, were fed animal [products]).

Apparently, Martin thinks we've run afoul of nature. I wonder how he feels about other human endeavors that similarly run afoul of nature like airline travel (if we were supposed to fly, we'd have wings) or splitting atoms (if atoms were meant to be split they wouldn't be so small).

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