Carmel apples, ice cream products and cheese have been the potential bearers of bad gifts this holiday season.  Of the last six most recent FDA recalls involving potential health risks five involve contamination with Listeria Monocytogenes.  These recalls involve the following foods in a number of states:

  • Ice cream products in Oregon, Washington, Arizona, Idaho, California, Washington, Alaska, Colorado, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, Texas, Utah, Wyoming
  • Carmel apples in Missouri, Arizona, California, Nevada, Texas and Utah
  • Raw milk cheddar cheese in Michigan (raw milk is never a good idea anyway)

Listeria monocytogenes is an organism which can cause serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and others with weakened immune systems.  Although healthy individuals may suffer only short-term symptoms such as high fever, severe headache, stiffness, nausea, abdominal pain and diarrhea, listeria infection can cause miscarriages and stillbirths among pregnant women.

For information on the recalls, read the official FDA notices linked below:

For my friends and family in Michigan that may be tempted to imbibe raw milk, I can’t leave this entry without saying that consuming raw milk and its byproducts is to revert back to nineteenth century sanitation.  Louis Pasteur with his discovery that heating raw milk for a half minute or so would prevent harmful infection from Salmonella, E. coli, and Campylobacter and other enteric diseases made the world a safer place.  In my opinion, pasteurization is up there with the inventions of electricity and internal combustion for top things that changed the world for the better.  It never ceases to amaze me that a market even exists for drinking raw milk.  Would these same people eat raw chicken?  I don’t get it.  Enough said.  For more information on food safety and raw milk see  CDC’s page on the topic.