Part One: Should We Be Afraid of Our Food?
1: Sick: It’s What’s for Dinner. Is Anybody Keeping Our Food
Safe?
2: Too Many Cooks, Not Enough Test Tubes: Why a Broken Food-Safety
System is Failing to Protect Us
3: Tracing to Safety: The Real-Life “CSI” of an Outbreak
4: The Whole World in Your Kitchen: That Hamburger Came from Five
Nations
5: Dirty Dishes: What Happens to the Perpetrators?
Part Two: How to Feed Your Family Safely and Sanely
6: Handle with Care – and Bleach – How to Avoid Illness, from the
Shopping Cart to the Compost Heap
7: Killer Sprouts and Slimy Spinach: The Most Dangerous Foods May
Surprise You
8: Dances with DNA, and Reconsidering Radiation: Will Mad Science
Ruin Food or Save It?
9: So Now You're Sick: How to Tell the Difference Between a “Touch
of Food Poisoning” and Deadly Illness
10: Eating Healthy and Eating Safe: No, They Aren’t the Same Thing
Michael Booth is the lead health care writer for The Denver Post
and has covered health, medicine, health policy and politics
throughout his twenty five-year journalism career. He was part of
the team that won the 2013 and 2000 Pulitzer Prizes for Breaking
News. He has made frequent appearances on commercial and public
television and radio, and has won the National Education Writers’
Award, Best of the West, American Health Care Journalists honors,
and other awards. He also co-led the coverage of the most deadly
food-borne illness outbreak of the past century, the cantaloupe
listeria illnesses of 2011, with Jennifer Brown. Their coverage of
the listeria outbreak became the outline for a Congressional
committee’s scathing report about what went wrong at the source
farm and in the supply chain that sold the tainted melons.
Jennifer Brown is an investigative reporter with The Denver Post
and has covered health, medicine and health policy for the past
decade. She was part of the team that won the 2013 Pulitzer Prize
for Breaking News. Brown led the team covering the two-year debate
over national health care reform in 2009 and 2010. She has worked
at The Associated Press, The Tyler Morning Telegraph in Texas, and
The Hungry Horse News in Montana, and has won a National Headliner
Award, three Katie awards and the 2013 Best of the West award for
investigative journalism. Brown also has covered the Colorado
Legislature, the 2008 Democratic National Convention, and child
welfare reform. She co-led the coverage of the most deadly
food-borne illness outbreak of the past century, the cantaloupe
listeria illnesses of 2011, with Michael Booth.
In 2011, award-winning journalists Booth and Brown reported on the
major food poisoning outbreak (listeriosis) of the year in the US
for the newspaper. Here they rework and expand the story and
supplement it with more exciting data disseminated weekly by the
government's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The
first sentence in the publisher's blurb for the book, 'Americans
are afraid of their food,' sets the tone. From there, the authors
proceed to reveal the hidden terror of germ warfare that underlies
the process of bringing food from dirt to table. . . .Summing Up:
Recommended. . . .General readers.
*CHOICE*
Beginning with a chilling reminder about how contaminated
cantaloupe killed consumers in 2011, journalists Booth and Brown of
The Denver Post present an eye-opening, authoritative account of
the everyday dangers in the U.S. food industry and provide short
term consumers solutions safer eating. The authors list spinach,
peanuts, and eggs as culprits in recent outbreaks of E Coli,
Salmonella and Listeria and explore the causes and consequences
affecting Americans. Fred Pritzker, a Minneapolis attorney who
specializes in food illness cases, deplores the FDA’s “willful
negligence” of food safety procedures and of criminal prosecution
towards the people responsible. But the government can’t anticipate
the food fads that create challenges for the 2,800 food-related FDA
employees reviewing 350,000 food makers and facilities or the 1,800
FDA inspectors checking U.S. imports. With a lax penalty system and
the startling statistic that “[n]early 50 million Americans will
get food poisoning this year,” it pays to be an educated shopper.
The authors’ thorough examination leads way to complimentary
resources and tips for safer eating.
*Publishers Weekly*
More than a little Michael Moore–type scary is this eye-opening
exposé of foods, grocery shopping, and government oversight in
America. Two Denver Post journalists, who investigated the 2011
deadly listeria outbreak (32 killed by eating cantaloupes), use
those same skills of inquiry in preparing an account that every
U.S. consumer should read. At the beginning, the authors
graphically describe many contemporary food crises, from the 1993
Jack in the Box hamburger issues to horse meat found in IKEA
meatballs. Nailbiting aside, they take readers through the
constraints faced by the FDA and USDA (in numbers alone, 2,800 FDA
employees supervise 350,000 food makers); the methodology that the
Centers for Disease control and Prevention and epidemiologists use
to figure out illness causes; a perspective on food imports (more
than 10 million shipments each year arrive at 320 U.S. ports); and
penalties levied on the perpetrators. Most important, though, is
the diagnostic and prevention section, keeping families safe (and,
yes, sane). Through the authors’ eyes, readers will learn how to
handle different foods, especially those most prone to bacteria;
new, upcoming on-stream technologies that might help stem these
outbreaks, from genetically engineered foods to nanotechnology; the
five most common gastroenteritis symptoms; and what other
manufacturers and agencies are doing to keep us safe. After all,
concludes Mile High Organics CEO Michael Joseph, 'It’s really scary
to worry your food is going to kill you.'
*Booklist, Starred Review*
More than a little Michael Moore–type scary is this eye-opening
exposé of foods, grocery shopping, and government oversight in
America, the most important part being the diagnostic and
prevention section.
*Booklist*
This book gets to a 'sweet spot' about food safety that we often
dance around. . . Eating Dangerously is a well-sourced book. . .
because of all the knowledgeable sources used in putting together
this excellent book.
*Food Safety News*
A hard-nosed look at the danger of dining.
*William D. Marler, Esq., Marler Clark LLP PS, The Food Safety Law
Firm*
The process should be easy: Food is produced, inspected,
distributed, sold, eaten. When things go wrong, the culprit should
be clear. Right? Not so fast. Booth and Brown shed light on a
byzantine food-safety system fraught with imperfect oversight and
buck-passing profiteers. But hope rises. Dedicated reformists,
life-saving epidemiologists, and careful consumers (you) are
working to make it better. Eating Dangerously offers tools for
understanding, and avoiding, the perils of modern eating.
*Tucker Shaw, author of Everything I Ate and Gentlemen Start Your
Ovens; Denver Post features editor and former Denver Post food
critic*
Just when you thought it was safe to eat food again, Eating
Dangerously comes along and returns you to reality: Our food system
from farm to kitchen is filled with potential safety issues that
sicken 48 million and kill 3,000 Americans annually. Health
reporter Michael Booth and investigative reporter Jennifer Brown
have pulled together the human tragedies and criminal behaviors
behind these gross statistics and written a readable exposé on
recent foodborne illness outbreaks in America. Just as valuable are
the practical tips for buying, storing, and preparing food that, if
followed, will reduce your chances of ending up a statistic in the
next outbreak.
*Andrew F. Smith, culinary historian*
Food is a vital element of life that should be taken seriously.
This book will serve as an exemplary wake-up call since it
enlightens us about the industry where food comes from, and it
explains what food really goes through to reach our dinner plates.
In essence, the authors skillfully remind the reader that good
nutrition should begin with self rather than with government.
*Naheed Ali, MD, PhD, author of The Obesity Reality: A
Comprehensive Approach to a Growing Problem*
As a cardiologist and a chef I work with people around the world
about what healthful eating is and how to accomplish it. But far
too many people assume healthful ingredients are safe ingredients.
Eating Dangerously quite literally brings this difference home.
Authors Booth and Brown have compiled an impeccably researched
collection of horror stories more troubling than any work of
fiction. But they have also given us a guidebook of tips and
techniques that allows us to retrieve the sanitary along with our
sanity. This is an indispensable companion for anyone who
appreciates that the quality of our food must not only be better;
it must first be safe.
*Michael S. Fenster, M.D., author of The Grassroots Gourmet; co
host of Cooking From the Heart with Forbes Riley and Dr. Mike*
This is a must read for anyone who cares about their health and
their wellness. Not just for themselves but for everyone. This
powerful guide will serve to educate and inspire you to be both a
catalyst and an activist for food, food safety, and for living your
best and most healthy life.
*James Rouse, N.M.D., founder, Optimum Wellness Media*
Americans once assumed that the food on their grocery shelves was
wholesome to eat. Sadly, that's no longer a safe
assumption. Booth and Brown explain clearly the hidden
dangers lurking in the foods we eat, and they offer sound advice
about what you can do to protect yourself and your family.
*Karl Weber, author and editor, Food Inc.*
Two Denver Post investigative reporters scare the heck out of you
by citing CDC statistics on food-borne illnesses and deaths in the
United States, then carefully and expertly steer you back to
(relative) safety with commonsense suggestions on how to reduce
your risk of falling ill--or worse. There's even a section
discussing GMO and organic foods and the 'intersection between food
technology and food safety.' Reviewer Janet Crum called this one
'both alarming and empowering' and 'highly recommended'.
*Library Journal*
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