Chapter 9

- Compared with several decades ago, how common are food-related illnesses today?

In the book, you will find that every day in the U.S, roughly 200,000 people are sickened by a foodborne disease, 900 are hospitalized, and 14 die. Over the past two decades scientists have discovered more than a dozen new foodborne pathogens other than E. coli 0157:H7. These pathogens include Campylobacter jejuni, Cryptosporidium parvum, Cyclospora cayetanesis, Listeria monocytogenes, and Norwalk-like viruses. According to the CDC, it is estimated that more than three-quarters of the food-related illnesses and deaths in the U.S have not yet been identified.

-How has the centralization of food production influenced the spread of food-related illnesses?

During this generation of people, meat production is more centralized than ever before. This is because fast food restaraunts or meat manufacturing businesses are trying to do everything they can to provide massive amounts of uniform beef. For example, McDonalds produces their hamburger patties the exact same way every time to get the same exact taste every time. This keeps consumors coming back for more, noticing that every hamburger will always taste just as good as the last. Although this is good for the businesses, people are beginning to suffer much more than they were just a couple of decades ago. The centralization of meat producing companies has gotten to the point where only thirteen large packinghouses now slaughter the majority of beef consumed in the U.S. In result, if one mass production of beef from only one packinghouse is released with the pathogen E. coli, almost one-thirteenth of the beef provided throughout the whole country will be infected with the lethal pathogen.