Perception Trumps Reality --- Again

Once again, perception trumps reality: Despite all of the fretting over food safety following the recent discoveries of BSE, chicken flu and tainted tuna, the incidence of food-borne illness continues to decline.

In 2002, for example, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported a 23-percent overall decrease in bacterial food-borne illnesses since 1996.

Even so, restaurants are dealing with a torrent of food safety-related concerns.

"Food safety issues used to come up once or twice a year, but now they are almost weekly," said Steven Grover, vice president of health and safety regulatory affairs for the National Restaurant Association. "We now have 24-7 news coverage. Many hazards put forth aren't really hazards at all when you look at the context but they are shocking and unusual."

The real irony is that the things that are most likely to make you sick draw scant attention from the media, largely because the “aren’t as exotic,” he said.

"Salmonella is the number one food borne killer, but that's not getting headlines," Grover said. "The ones that get reported in the news media aren't anywhere near the top. Unfortunately salmonella isn't sexy or isn't new."

Posted by Jim Langcuster at March 24, 2004 10:56 AM | TrackBack