For those of you who ate some recently, keep in mind that the chances of any one person getting ill is vanishingly tiny. So I know you will worry, but it’s really unlikely you had an infected lettuce. Millions of people probably eat Romaine every day, but as far as I’ve heard, there’s been less than a 100 cases. So the odds are very much in your favor.
I would eat Romaine from a CSA, Thumper, though I might check with the farm. CDC has to be comprehensive on this, but that doesn’t mean every head grown is at risk.
I googled a bit and couldn’t find out why romaine lettuce has E. coli, but other lettuce types apparently don’t. This isn’t the first ban on romaine, specifically.
What are the romaine growers doing? Using untreated waste water for irrigation? What distinguishes the cultivation of romaine vs other lettuce types?
When I see articles like these in the media, it’s always irritating that journalists don’t ask the obvious questions. If the answers are not known, at least SAY so. And interview people that might actually have a clue.
I can’t read the WaPo article because it’s behind a paywall.
Yes, of course, produce is not grown in sterile environments. But romaine seems to be particularly prone to E. coli contamination. The public doesn’t keep getting warnings about contaminated broccoli, for example. Romaine, yes.
Why romaine? The most popular lettuce. Also, some plants can apprently draw water with bacteria innit into its “veins,” so it is impossible to remove the contamination by washing.
Anyone who is shocked produce can be contaminated - you need to visit a farm. Especially an organic farm that uses composted manure (or not so much composed).
I don’t see how it can be claimed that the instances of romaine contamination are unrelated when the FDA and CDC have yet to define the source of the latest contamination.
@whatisyourquest – see the CDC announcement in my first post. The DNA in this e.coli is different from that in the outbreak earlier this year. However, it is the same as the e.coli in the 2017 outbreak.
I think the thing that most worries the CDC is that they don’t know the source of this outbreak or the similar one in 2017.
I love romaine lettuce and eat it all the time. I buy about 2 heads a week, tear and wash it in a salad spinner, and store it in a large ziploc bag with a tea towel in it to absorb moisture. My order at my favorite takeout place is a salad bowl with lots of romaine. I have romaine in the bag now; the first night I ate some in a salad, last night DS and I both ate some in tacos, and I was planning to have leftovers tonight. No way to know if it is all right, I guess, it hasn’t been long enough. Ugh!
I wonder how many millions of heads shipped vs the number made ill.
I remember the old days traveling in Europe and everyone ran the risk.
So for now, I’ll avoid it. Getting into too much detail about origins of health issues is uncomfortable. I used to live near big commercial farms in CA.
I have two bags of mixed greens in the fridge and both have romaine in them. I’m sure my market will take them back and swap them for something else. They take back anything.
Since this is a multi-state outbreak, I can almost guarantee that the head of romaine that you bought from your local farm is perfectly safe to eat. All of these recalls are really just a wake-up call to buy locally from farmers you know, whenever this is possible.
Just returned from Costco (had to buy more eggs because kid and her BF are staying overnight and will need breakfast). The produce cooler was romaine-free! Kudos to Costco. I grabbed a tub of spinach. Might make a dip or omelette or something.
After the big outbreak in 2011 that killed five people and caused kidney failure in 27 more, traced to contaminated irrigation water, Congress ordered the FDA to come up with a fix, which they did, and which was supposed to take effect this year: farmers would have to test their irrigation water.
That regulation was subsequently delayed under pressure from farmers, who didn’t want to bother. Now they can wait until 2024 before they have to make sure they’re not irrigating food crops with water contaminated with feces.
All I can say is to those of you debating whether to eat romaine from a grocery store (I’ll give a pass to romaine from a local farmer/csa) is that wasting a few bucks if you don’t want to return it just isn’t worth the risk even if it is a small risk. Plus, there are so many other lettuce varieties out there to try/eat instead!