Rotten Odds: Food Poisoning Sickens 1 in 6 Americans Yearly

Update 12/21/10: It took more than a year-and-a-half of pushing, but on December 21, 2010, Congress finally passed the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act (S. 510). The move came after more than 1,800 Change.org members signed our petition asking Congress to pass the food safety reform bill. You can read more about this victory here.

The old adage for refrigerator leftovers "when in doubt, throw it out" can unfortunately only go so far in keeping you and your family safe at meal time. Because reform for our federal food safety standards is long overdue, the serious threat of foodborne illness lurks even before you've brought your groceries home from the store.

Nearly one in six people — or roughly 48 million individuals — in the United States are sickened by the food they eat each year and more than 3,000 die, according to two new studies from the the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). What makes these stats particularly upsetting is the fact that many of the illnesses and deaths caused by these foodborne pathogens could be prevented with the help of improved safety standards. Those standards could soon be a reality with your help.

While the number of people reported to be sickened by foodborne diseases like salmonella (one of the worst offenders) has  dropped since a previous report from 1999 — when the estimates were closer to 76 million people sickened and 5,000 deaths — that change is deceiving. The lower count doesn't necessarily mean food poisoning has declined, merely that the quality and the quantity of the data used has improved and new methods are being used to track foodborne disease. And what's really important to keep in mind is that thousands — if not millions — of incidents of food-related illness go unreported each year, so the real numbers are likely to be much higher.

What's even more unsettling is the fact that only a small portion of the dangerous pathogens responsible for foodborne illnesses have been identified. Only 9.4 million of the 48 million yearly illnesses are caused by the 31 known foodborne pathogens, while the remaining 38 million are caused by unspecified pathogens. Marc Siegel, associate professor of medicine at New York University in New York City, cites these numbers as all the more reason to clean up the 'sloppiness' of America's food processing industry. "That really ramps up the need for better scrutiny, better surveillance and better prevention techniques and better screening tests for pathogens," Siegel said.

Improving the standards and testing methods for food safety inspections will not only keep thousands of Americans healthy and alive, but reform will also save billions of dollars in health care costs every year. According to Chris Braden, acting director of CDC's Division of Foodborne, Waterborne, and Environmental Diseases, if we can help reduce foodborne illnesses by just 1 percent, then we can keep roughly 500,000 people from getting sick from the food they eat. Help improve those odds by telling your Senators to pass the food safety reform bill, the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act (S.510)!

Photo credit: Leon Brocard via Flickr