From salmonella-contaminated grape tomatoes to smoked salmon laced with Listeria, pathogens in the food stream always make headlines. Rightly so, considering the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that each year one out of six Americans gets sick, 128,000 are hospitalized, and 3,000 die due to food-borne diseases.
Nearly three-quarters of consumers are more concerned about food safety vs. five years ago, according to a Deloitte 2011 Consumer Food and Product Insights Survey. This represents a jump of eight percentage points since the same survey was conducted in 2011.
Food safety is even a national topic; President Barack Obama recently signed into law the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Food Safety Modernization Act, which aims to keep our food supply safe by shifting the focus of federal regulators from responding to contamination to preventing it.
Escalating concerns over food safety have given rise to myths and confusion over how you can best protect yourself from foodborne illness in your home. According to Jamie Stamey, M.S., R.D., a food safety consultant who spoke about food safety myths at a January, 2011 Food and Culinary Professionals Dietetic Practice Group presentation, "Myths may have just enough science or good sense to be believable. They frequently travel quickly through informal media."You can protect yourself against foodborne illness by getting accurate information. Our food safety expert cuts through the hype on some of today's most widespread food safety myths:
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