MythBusters: Dishing up food safety fact from fiction

The Partnership for Food Safety Education Tackles Four Common Food Safety Myths

Recipes can be handed down from generation to generation and so can myths surrounding food safety — sometimes with sickening consequences. September is National Food Safety Education Month and the Partnership for Food Safety Education (PFSE), in cooperation with the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, is marking the occasion with an outreach to consumers aimed at debunking four common food safety myths:

Myth: Lemon juice and salt will clean and sanitize a cutting board.
Fact: Sanitizing is the process of reducing the number of microorganisms that are on a properly cleaned surface to a safe level to reduce risk of foodborne illness. Lemon juice and salt will not do this. An effective way to sanitize cutting boards and other kitchen surfaces, is with a diluted bleach and water solution — just 1 tablespoon unscented liquid chlorine bleach (not more) to 1 gallon of water. To clean your cutting board, first wash it with hot water and soap. After rinsing it off with clean water, sanitize by letting the diluted chlorine bleach solution stand on the cutting board surface for about a minute. Rinse and blot dry with clean paper towels. It is important to clean and sanitize – just because a surface looks clean, does not mean it is free of disease-causing bacteria!

Myth: Putting chicken in a colander and rinsing it with water will remove bacteria like Salmonella.
Fact: Rinsing chicken in a colander will not remove bacteria. In fact, it can spread raw juices around your sink, onto your countertops, and onto ready-to-eat foods. Bacteria in raw meat and poultry can only be killed when cooked to a safe minimum internal temperature, which for poultry is 165 F, as measured by a food thermometer. Save yourself the messiness of rinsing raw poultry. It is not a safety step and can cause cross-contamination.

Myth: Once a hamburger turns brown in the middle, it is fully cooked.
Fact: You cannot use visual cues to determine whether food has been cooked to a safe minimum internal temperature. The ONLY way to know that food has been cooked to a safe minimum internal temperature is to use a food thermometer. Ground meat should be cooked to a safe minimum internal temperature of 160 F, as measured by a food thermometer.

Myth: You should not put hot food in the refrigerator.
Fact: Hot foods can be placed directly in the refrigerator. A large pot of food like soup or stew should be divided into small portions and put in shallow containers for quicker cooling in the refrigerator. If you leave food out to cool and forget about it, then toss it! Bacteria grow rapidly in the “danger zone” between 40 F and 140 F. Always follow the “two hour rule” for cooked foods – eat them or refrigerate them within two hours at a refrigerator temperature of 40 F or below. And, if left out in a room or outdoors where the temperature is 90 F or above, food should be refrigerated or eaten within just 1 hour – or discarded.

“People want to do the right thing to reduce risk of foodborne illness to themselves and their families,” said Shelley Feist, PFSE’s Executive Director. “By highlighting common food safety myths, the Partnership hopes to raise awareness with consumers of the facts behind the four core Fight BAC!(R) messages of Clean, Separate, Cook, and Chill.”

Foodborne illness comes with an expensive price tag, not only in terms of human suffering, but also associated health costs and lost productivity.

Educational materials including a video, teacher materials, and other consumer-friendly tools are available for free download at www.fightbac.org.

Source: U.S. Food and Drug Administration


Data from 190 Healthcare Facilities in Nine States from California to Maine

A patient health and safety survey of 190 American hospitals from coast to coast compiled by registered nurses in eight different states finds that a disturbing number of our nation’s healthcare facilities are not prepared for the coming H1N1/swine flu pandemic, according to results released today by the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee.

The data reflects a survey conducted over the past four weeks by RNs in hospitals in Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Maine, Minnesota, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Texas.

What the RNs reported are wide gaps in safety gear, infection control training, and post-exposure procedures. Among key findings:

– At more than one-fourth of the hospitals, nurses cite inadequate isolation of swine flu patients, increasing the risk of infection to others.
– Nurses at 15 percent of hospitals do not have access to the proper respirator masks, exposing nurses and patients to infection; at up to 40 percent of the hospitals, nurses are expected to re-use masks, in violation of Centers for Disease Control Guidelines.
– At 18 percent of the hospitals, RNs report that nurses have become infected; one Sacramento, Calif. RN has already died.

CNA/NNOC is calling on all hospitals to adhere to the highest standard of protection for patients and nurses to combat the expected onslaught of new cases this fall and winter, and urging legislators to strengthen public protections.

“These continuing problems increase the risk that many hospitals will become vectors for infection, with inadequate patient protections leading to a spread of the pandemic among other patients, their friends, family, and caregivers, and the surrounding community,” warned Deborah Burger, RN, CNA/NNOC co-president. “What we’re hearing from around the country is dangerous to patient health and safety, but with smart and clinically appropriate leadership we can fix policies in time for the upcoming pandemic.”

Among other findings:

  • At 19 percent of the hospitals all or some appropriate N95 respirator masks were not “fitted” to ensure their effectiveness against the virus.
  • More than one in five, 22 percent of the facilities, do not have enough masks, say nurses.
  • Nurses at fewer than half of facilities report that they have been adequately trained on H1N1 issues, including identification of infected patients, and procedures for caring for these patients.

To help combat these problems, CNA/NNOC called for:

  • Minimize infection of hospital patients and workers by strict adherence to the highest standard of infection control procedures, including identification and isolation with appropriate ventilation of infected patients.
  • All hospital workers and visitors must be provided with appropriate protection gear at the highest government standards, including N95 respirator masks or better for all who enter the isolation room of a confirmed or suspected H1N1 patient.
  • Any RN who is unable to work due to contracting a communicable or infectious disease identified or treated in his or her hospital/clinic shall be guaranteed sick leave, not face disciplinary action, and shall be presumptively eligible for workers’ compensation.
  • Implement a moratorium on any closures of emergency rooms, layoffs of direct healthcare personnel, and reductions of hospital beds.
  • Federal guidelines for protection must be developed that are consistent across agencies.
  • Disposable respirator masks must not be re-used. In the event of a demonstrated national mask shortage, facilities should adhere to government recommendations on mask conservation.

Source:  www.CalNurses.org


In response to the quickly emerging need for associations and other organizations to deploy social networking tools for their members or constituents, tech startup Engageon LLC officially released its first installation of the Engageon Association Builder (EAB).

The first launch was developed for the National Lipid Association (NLA) which can be found at www.lipid.org. Typically, most organizations have a homepage for distributing news and enrolling members or visitors. The EAB software brings an entirely new level of “Web 2.0″ interactivity to individuals who can then collaborate and communicate their interests into a broader community of thought.

With the release of the first EAB installation, the NLA and its community of 3500 interdisciplinary medical specialists achieved the first critical milestone in the quest to deploy a medical workspace on the Internet tailored to the needs of cholesterol experts worldwide. “The goals set out by the NLA and Engageon were to develop a cost-effective way to empower members in an online community where opinion is facilitated as part of the decision-making process and policies of leadership,” says Vera Bittner, MD, president of the NLA.

Ash Lulla, CEO of Engageon, says, “We achieved this goal in response to an emerging strategic need for organizations to connect with their membership. We are very pleased to launch this first effort with the NLA.” Regarding next steps, Lulla says, “We are now working to build several additional medical communities and our intent is that EAB will bring a new and transparent level of exchange among scientific communities and their interests”.

Engageon LLC is exploring other unique opportunities and developing solutions for organizations to create collaborative tools in the global marketplace. You are invited to engage with them and visit the company online at www.engageon.com.

Source: Engageon LLC


Results suggest testosterone has effects on risk-sensitive financial decisions and long-term career choices

The battle of the sexes rages on, this time from the trading floor. While there has long been debate about the social and biological differences between men and women, new research by the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and the University of Chicago’s Department of Comparative Human Development explores how the hormone testosterone plays an important role in gender differences in financial risk aversion and career choice.

Prior research has shown that testosterone enhances competitiveness and dominance, reduces fear, and is associated with risky behaviors like gambling and alcohol use. However, until now, the impact of testosterone on gender differences in financial risk-taking has not been explored.

The new paper, “Gender differences in financial risk aversion and career choices are affected by testosterone,” has been published in the Aug. 24, 2009 early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The research was conducted by Paola Sapienza, Associate Professor, Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University; Luigi Zingales, Robert McCormick Professor, University of Chicago Booth School of Business; and Dario Maestripieri, Professor in Comparative Human Development, University of Chicago.

“In general, women are more risk averse than men when it comes to making important financial decisions, which in turn can affect their career choices,” said Sapienza. “For example, in our sample set, 36 percent of female MBA students chose high-risk financial careers such as investment banking or trading, compared to 57 percent of male students. We wanted to explore whether these gender differences are related to testosterone, which men have, on average, in higher concentrations than women.”

The researchers, using an economic-based measure of risk aversion, found that higher levels of testosterone were associated with a greater appetite for risk in women, but not among men. However, in men and women with similar levels of testosterone, the gender difference in risk aversion disappeared. Additionally, the researchers reported that the link between risk aversion and testosterone predicted career choices after graduation: individuals who were high in testosterone and low in risk aversion chose riskier careers in finance.

“This is the first study showing that gender differences in financial risk aversion have a biological basis, and that differences in testosterone levels between individuals can affect important aspects of economic behavior and career decisions,” said Maestripieri. “That the effects of testosterone on risk aversion are strongest for individuals with low or intermediate levels of this hormone is similar to what has been shown for the effects of testosterone on spatial cognition.”

To investigate the relationship between testosterone and risk aversion, the authors measured testosterone levels in saliva samples (as well as markers of prenatal testosterone such as finger length) from approximately 500 MBA students at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

The uncharacteristically large sample–which was global in demographic scope–was familiar with financial risk by virtue of their education, and many pursued financial careers after business school. Also, the participants were relatively homogeneous in age, cultural and educational background, and socioeconomic status, thereby minimizing the effects of other non-biological variables.

As part of a mandatory MBA course, the students were asked to participate in a laboratory experiment to measure the relationship between risk and hormonal levels. Over two days in October 2006, the participants were asked to play a computer game that evaluated their risk aversion attitudes. They answered a series of questions that asked them to choose between accepting a guaranteed monetary award or choosing a risky lottery with a higher potential payout. Students had to choose repeatedly between the lottery and a fixed payment at increasing values. Two saliva samples were collected, once before the session and once after the test was completed, to measure hormonal changes over that time period.

As expected, more risk-prone participants chose the lottery more often, whereas more risk-averse individuals preferred the guaranteed payout. Overall, men exhibited significantly lower risk aversion than women in the study, and also had significantly higher levels of salivary testosterone than women.

“This study has significant implications for how the effects of testosterone could impact actual risk-taking in financial markets, because many of these students will go on to become major players in the financial world,” said Zingales. “Furthermore, it could shed some light on gender differences in career choices. Future studies should further explore the mechanisms through which testosterone affects the brain.”

Source: Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University


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