Category: Consumers

Airport Security Bins – Full of Germs

 

Finnish and British researchers swabbed trays at the Helsinki Airport and discovered that half of the samples were contaminated with rhinovirus or adenovirus—two categories of common viruses that can trigger cold-like symptoms.

http://mentalfloss.com/article/556466/bins-at-airport-security-are-incredibly-dirty-germs

This type of news is provocative, but it needs to be put in perspective. Anything that lots of people touch all day, and isn’t regularly cleaned, is like this. Door handles. Pay phones. Fuel pumps at gas stations. It is just the nature of things.

And they’ll say “worse than public toilets”. That’s because public toilets get cleaned a lot.

These germs are not airborne. You need to ingest them to potentially get sick. When someone sneezes or coughs into the air, and you are close by, that is how.

Otherwise, feel free to touch all of those germ-riddled surfaces, just don’t put your fingers in your mouth, or on food, without washing them first. Basic stuff.

 

Antibiotic-free Meats Selling Well

Consumer Reports sent shoppers to 136 stores in 23 states, belonging to the 13 largest supermarket chains, to see what kind of meat and poultry products raised without antibiotics are offered and at what price.

What they found is encouraging. The shoppers found that one chain, Whole Foods, is already offering nothing but meat and poultry raised without antibiotics. Several others – Giant, Hannaford, Shaw’s, Stop & Shop, Publix, and Trader Joe’s – had broad selections of these products. At only four chains were shoppers unable to find any organic or other products raised without antibiotics: Sam’s Club, Food 4 Less, Food Lion, and Save-A-Lot. [Source]

They also found that the antibiotic-free meats weren’t necessarily any more expensive. Unfortunately, this consumer preference has not made any inroads into processed meats – where 80% of U.S. meat ends up.

In a national survey, more than 85% of adult consumers said they thought that fresh meat raised without antibiotics should be available in their local stores and supermarkets. Consequently Consumer Reports have launched a new campaign – Meat Without Drugs, Stop the Superbugs with a companion website, www.MeatWithoutDrugs.org, and this video: