Don't Eat Poop! A Food Safety Podcast

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Francine: It's quite coincidental that these eight Olympians participated in the same events and they all got sick around the same time. The other athletes weren't sick with the same illness.

Matt: When I was watching the Olympics and I kept, this kept coming up about these people about to swim in the same, all I could think about was, man, we got to do a don't drink poop episode.

There we go. They were drinking a lot of poop in that as they're swimming along.

Francine: Yeah, they spent 1. 5 billion cleaning that river.

intro: Everybody's got to eat and nobody likes getting sick. That's why heroes toil in the shadows, keeping your food safe at all points from the supply chain to the point of sale. Join industry veterans Francine L. Shaw and Matt Ragucci for a deep dive into food safety. It all boils down to one golden rule.

Don't. Eat poop. Don't eat poop.

Matt: Hello. Hello, Francine. Hey Matt. It's been a while. It has been a while. Somebody decided to go on a vacation. I did an extended vacation. I've never done that before. I know. That's exciting. For as long as I know you never ever workaholic. So I guess we could jump into this.

Speaking of workaholics because who we're talking about are definitely workaholics. I think Olympians are workaholics. I think they have to be to a degree. I don't know any other way to prepare for the competition like they do. It's their life. Except for the dude that just walked up in one like got silver in the shooting competition, which is fascinating because my daughter was on track to be an Olympian shooter and she spent so much time, had these crazy outfits.

Like she spent so much time practicing shooting and just getting mentally ready. And this guy like turkey with a beer belly walks up with his gun, just Wow. Okay. Some of those curlers. I don't know. I think maybe they probably play it like in the winter Olympics, the curling when they're, I think a bunch of them probably came from a beer league and then we're like really good.

I don't know. But yeah, Olympians are crazy. A hundred percent. It's like the dedication that it takes and the mental stamina that it takes to prepare for something like that is just absolutely amazing. Yeah. And I live in Colorado Springs, so I know people that are Olympians and I know people that work with Olympians and holy cow, their life, it's completely different.

Like they live a completely different life than I do. We work hard. We're constantly busy. I have a ton of children, so I live a different life in that way. But just their dedication to that is like three jobs in one. It's crazy. Well, they can get up before the crack of dawn to start practicing. And I think that should be illegal.

So we're like working out before they've had a cup of coffee. I don't know if that's how you do that. These entrepreneurs that say, well, you need to get up at 4 a. m. To be successful and you've got to do this and this before the sun comes up. I'm not that person. I will never be that person because I'm just not a morning person.

Francine: Now I'm going to stay up until two in the morning and work after everybody goes to bed. I am not willing to get up at 4 AM unless if I'm getting up at 4 AM for you, I either love you or it's. important. Yeah. And so I'm the opposite because I, there's another guy that I do projects with and he works from 9 p.

Matt: m. to 3 o'clock in the morning and whenever I'm a good do a project with him, my wife is like, well, it looks like I'm not going to be seeing you at a bed anytime soon. That is not where I function. I'm the opposite. I function very well at four or 5, 6, 7, 8 o'clock in the morning. I love that. But then by the time it's three, four o'clock in the afternoon, I'm done.

My brain is fried. It's fascinating. Everybody's different, but talking about these Olympians and you're right. They wake up early. They work out long hours.

I'm surprised they jumped in that same river.

Francine: Yeah, that's another thing. They have to adapt to their conditions wherever they happen to be. So they have to be very flexible and very adaptable and can imagine jumping into that river.

And this is what is

Matt: we should give the context. So what we're gonna be talking about is during the olympics, the french government cleaned the same river. They, they cleaned it, quote unquote. I'm using like big air quotes here. They cleaned the same river. They spent 1. 4 billion or something like that cleaning the river so that Olympians could swim in the river during their events.

And. When I first heard that, I was like, no way.

Francine: Now this river's been polluted for decades and nobody's been allowed to swim in it. And now they're going to spend all this money. They're going to clean the river and let the Olympians swim in the river. And suddenly it's okay to swim in because they've spent all this money cleaning the river.

In the meantime, it continues to rain and the river continues to get polluted. So true. But it's safe for the Olympians, the triathletes and whatever to get in this river and swim. The mayor Harris jumps in the river and swims herself. Now that does not in my mind prove a valid point. Now, if she would have drank the water.

Okay, now I believe that it's safe for them to swim in it. Her jumping in that river and swimming in my mind did not prove a valid point because when these athletes are swimming They're going to drink that water. It's going to get in their mouth no matter how hard they try and go up their nose and they're gonna swallow some of that water.

No matter how hard they try not to her to jump in there in a controlled situation and swim in that water when she's not competing and say, Oh, yeah, it's safe to swim in is a bunch of bullshit. That's how I feel.

Matt: So you're the mayor and you're like, it's safe. I'm going to jump in. I don't know. It's like the saying that my parents told me and that I told my kids like, okay, well, if your friend jumps off a cliff, will you do it?

Francine: Oh, so this is the thing they've trained for years to get to this point and for some of them they're only going to have one opportunity. So do they take the risk? Because it's either you swim in the river or you don't compete. Right. And from what I understand, a few of them didn't compete because of that.

Matt: Well, they competed in that event and then weren't able to compete in some of the other ones.

Francine: I think maybe they chose not to compete because they didn't want to. I think so. I could be wrong, but I think that maybe they chose. Not to

Matt: there was like stuff where the news was like, well, it rained earlier today. So the heat is higher than it should be, but we're hoping that everything will be fine.

Francine: They delayed the event. So they did then have the event and the athletes did swim in the river. And one of the athletes said, this is her comment while swimming down to the bridge. I felt the salt things that we shouldn't think about too much.

I drank a lot of water, so we'll know tomorrow if I'm sick or not. It doesn't taste like Coca Cola or Sprite, of course. The scene has been dirty for a hundred years, so they can't say the safety of the athletes is a priority. That's bullshit. 100 percent Well, there was plenty of bull cocky in that water.

I'm sure this river is huge. It's got runoff from industrial. It's got runoff for agriculture. It's got runoff for everything. We're talking about, okay, there are eight Olympians that got sick from this. Well, there has yet to be a quote unquote definitive link between their illnesses and swimming in the side.

That is also bullcrap, and it was just so done. Well, there's no definitive link between the eight Olympians that swam in the sign and their viral intestinal sickness, the coli that they got and all that. Like, okay, really? Then is Paris food that terrible that you guys are feeding Olympians that much terrible Infested pathogen infested junk that should be the other thing What do you want to say?

You can't go to Paris and eat our food or you're going to be like going to some Country out like third world country and getting sick. Is that what Paris is now? No, I think there's a link between eight olympians that swam in this river getting sick and the sign

it's quite coincidental That These eight Olympians participated in the same event and they all got set aroun other countries weren't s illness when

I was watchi I kept this kept coming u about to swim in the same about was man, we got to episode. There we go. The of poop in that as they'r

Yeah, they spent 1. 5 billion cleaning that river. I'm sorry, but 1. 5 billion dollars cleaning the saint.

How did they spend that money? Because that river is so huge. That to me sounds like a drop in the bucket. Or a drop in the Seine, you may say. There were drops in the Seine, all right. Of what, we're not exactly sure. But there were a lot of drops in that river. Okay, so the insanity of because the mayor swam in the river, therefore it's okay.

All I can think about is, Okay, so my family's been in agriculture forever, like multiple generations, and my grandpa was a dairy consultant, and dairymen, they grow their own feed, right? Well, when glyphosate first came out, glyphosate is the active ingredient in Roundup. When Roundup first came out, my grandfather remembers those sales guys drinking glyphosate.

Like, in a shot glass, they would pour it. This is so safe, I can drink it. Oh, we're finding out, like, all the cancers that, different stuff that can come from that. And you're like, okay. Yeah, just because they do that, doesn't mean that's okay. Just because they don't die acutely. Does it mean that they won't die at some point in time later on in their life?

Well, like I said, she got in there and she swam in the river. Yes. She wasn't swimming like an Olympian athlete for God's sake. Right. She's like doing like breaststrokes and treading water. She wasn't gulping. They're going to get water up their nose and in their mouth. And it's bound to happen. They're triathletes and they're athletes.

They're going to drink some of that water, whether they want to or not, but I've been more impressed if she drank a glass of the water, because that's what they're doing. They're drinking that water when they're competing. So true, Francine, that is way better test. Go in there with your big gulp and a straw.

Which by the way, you know, for anybody that's not in the United States, that's a great big container. That is a really good point. Yeah. She should have drank because really I swam in high school. I played water polo in high school. And when you're breathing heavily like that, and these are after The athletes have ran and biked for many miles and then they hop into the pool.

Matt: Yeah, this is, yeah, not good. Still to this day, which has been a couple weeks since the Olympics have ended. We don't know, like definitively, did they get sick from the same? So that's really sad to me, is that we literally live in a world at which we can't get real true information. We're not going to know because I don't think that their government is going to let us know.

Francine: Now, one of the athletes come out and say, yes, this is what it was. know how their medical community works. Is there a medical community going to be honest and say, Yes, this is what it was. Yes, this is what it came from. Yeah. So then it's okay if we're not getting real information about something like this, it's no wonder why we don't get real information about outbreaks and what's going wrong with the food and etcetera.

Matt: Because this is really high profile. Well, what's the opportunity and our ability to address these things become better and move forward when we don't get real answers?

Well, and even when we do get real answers, some of the people within our industry don't even know them, which kind of leads into your next thing about water.

Francine: Yeah. So let's start with this. I feel like everybody should know what potable or potable depending on what part of the country you're from. And the first thing we have to understand is that not everybody does. And it's drinkable water, non potable or potable would be non drinkable water. Now, I understand that not all people know what that term means, but if you're in the industry, if you're a consultant, or you're regulatory, or you're an inspector, an auditor, you surely should know.

What that word means. Would you agree? 100%. I mean, there's like no excuse for not knowing that there's a person and I don't want to say who it is because I don't want people to stop participating in the surveys. There was a question, and the question had to do with non potable water. And the question was, non potable water used for the final rinse of ready to eat produce must be maintained at which of these temperature ranges?

Room temperature, 4 to 10 degrees Celsius, 2 to 4 degrees Celsius, or other? Now, when I read the question, the first words, Non potable. So it's like working in the industry. Is that a typo? When I saw that pop up, I wondered if it was a typo as well. Cause I saw that and I was like, non potable water is a final rinse.

Matt: Is this a joke? Like, what are we talking about here? And I've read it a couple of times. Cause I'm like, am I just reading this? Is there like some kind of catch here? Because anytime we take any type of exam, it's like, they try to trip you up with the wording of the questions. And I'm like, okay. I guess before we go on to the results.

I want to make sure that we, potable water is, another way of saying potable water is drinking water, water that is safe for human beings to consume, human beings, dogs, whatever, to consume, so it's not agricultural water, although there is a push in some circles to have agricultural waters being potable, which is very different, and that would be like, from a canal, You irrigating your field with canal water is like probably not as bad, hopefully, as the river said, but not as good as potable water.

And so you're not going to go to the canal and start drinking out of it with the straw. Maybe if you have a live straw, like one of those filtering water straws, but you're not going to just go drinking from the canal. So that's why the question of final rinse. So if it's going through a processing plant and then that final rinse.

Right when the product will be bagg or be boxed and sent out that final rinse. Now that's what's gonna be on that product when it gets shelved. So go ahead and read the question again, Francine. Not to digress, but canal water can also make you sick. Yeah. Actually not change the topics, but most recently anyway.

Francine: Yes. So the question one more time. Non potable water. Use for the final rinse of a ready to eat produce must be maintained at which of these temperature ranges room temperature 4 to 10 degrees Celsius, 2 to 4 degrees Celsius or other. Now, I want to make it clear that many of the people who took this exam were food safety consultants.

DCQI or Third Party Food Safety Certification Auditor. We're industry people that should know this answer. 48 percent of the people didn't know the answer. I was shocked when I saw this too. It was a revolving conversation on LinkedIn. Mind you, this is a LinkedIn poll. So nobody is going to be paying that much attention.

Matt: You and I both were looking at that wondering if it was a typo. We're industry people. Or if that was the actual question, right? Non potable water. So I want to give a percentage of that 48%. They weren't glancing, they weren't looking at it. Clearly they were just glancing at it. They may have thought it said potable water or just thought it was a typo and then just move forward.

Francine: I agree. I think there's probably a percentage of people that misread the question, but we are talking about food safety people that generally their job is to not overlook those things. Even if 10 percent of the people misread the question, that number's too high. And let's say that another 10 percent weren't industry folks and just didn't understand the question, which I don't know why you'd participate if you didn't have any idea what you're talking about.

Matt: Industry people too, though. Although I don't know if you'd be connected with him if you're not. Yeah, I don't know. In the industry.

Francine: So even then we're down to 28%. If, and we're just guessing, we're just throwing these numbers out there. I don't know, I don't know. So, don't too many. It is how I feel. This is just my opinion and my opinion alone.

These people, a lot of them, not all, a lot of them have some sort of certification saying that they're qualified to do what they do. At the very minimum, they should know what potable water is. Potable water. We need to change our certification process or how we qualify people for these positions because clearly there's a problem.

And ask somebody that sells materials for certifications. So I'm part of that industry. It's, I sit here and say this, people go and take that exam. And I bought these people on many different levels in many different programs. Too many times people learn, they don't learn. They study just to pass an exam.

Matt: 100%. A certification goes on the wall and we never think about that information again. We do the job and we only remember what applies specifically to that job, but yet we might move to another sector of the industry and because we have that certification, that's all that matters. Many times, sometimes there's not always.

Francine: A continuing ed. Factors sometimes there isn't I'd rather personally know that somebody has the basic knowledge to do the job and they've just got a certificate hanging on the wall that says that they do and you and I talked about. One particular certification that neither of us would be qualified to do because we don't have a specific degree But yet I'm certain we've got the knowledge Oh, yeah, and they're eliminating a lot of people that are more than qualified to do the job And you do not have to have a science degree for instance to be detail oriented And really a lot of food safety and quality aspects are detail oriented tasks, right?

Matt: And so that's why I'm saying even if they misread it and answered it wrong because they misread it, which I think a lot of people did, that also shows an issue as well. Because if you have the degree, but you don't have the detail oriented, then it doesn't matter. You're still going to miss things. Well, and that misreading it shows that's part of the attention to detail factor.

Because even if you find the problem, so you're detailed enough, someone on the floor finds the problem. And so that's a detailed person that found an issue. If the corrective action is not done, that's another detail that gets missed. So much of the job of food safety and quality, so much of our job is following up with details.

Along the way, right? And that's an interesting task. And if you're missing questions because you just aren't reading them right, that's a whole other part of it, is what I'm trying to say. We need good people in every aspect. And there are good certification bodies. There are good auditors. There are good inspectors.

Francine: There are good consultants. My intention isn't to beat anybody up. I was just shocked. Yeah. Well, and the dialogue on that survey was painful. There were a lot of people getting beat up in that. Yes, there were a lot of valid points, whether or not a lot of what he says and does might create controversy.

Matt: True, yeah, I just don't like the way he does it. Enough so that we're not even talking about him. And just use him as a blanket. I think there are a lot of people in the industry that say the sky is falling so frequently, people just tune them out. If all you do is bash the industry for being terrible, For food safety and quality, the industry is not going to listen to you.

Do you get what I mean? And I think you and I do a pretty good job of striking that in between. We have to bring up relevant issues that are going on, but we have to do it in a way at which we can help companies get to a better place. And what I don't like is I don't like people that all they do is bash.

The sky is falling, the sky is falling. Everybody is terrible. The bigger you are, the worse you are. That doesn't help. I agree that there needs to be a balance. Not everything is bad. There is good, and there needs to be a balance between the good and bad. There are a lot of things that need to be corrected, and there's a lot of things that could be improved, but there's a lot of good people out there doing good things.

Francine: And not everybody is out for themselves. Not everybody is out there to make a dollar. There's a lot of people out there doing good things that aren't making a tremendous amount of money doing it. We are in a capitalistic society and every communist country I've met is still a capitalist country, right?

Matt: Like, it's funny when people talk about how they hate capitalism. And they want to be communist. And you're like, well, one communist country provides all of our fuel. A lot of them actually provide fuel. So they're selling fuel. And another one is basically the manufacturing arm of the world. They're obviously capitalists, right?

So if you're not going to increase food safety by then saying you have to go bankrupt. So there has to be a fine line in that as well. And that's what I always try to do is strike a balance with companies. Like you still have to make a profit. That makes absolute sense. But at the same time, you have to make sure that you're not killing your consumers.

Cause that's not going to help you make a profit. Right. And you and I talk about large companies and they mess up or they're failings. We also talk about, Hey, they probably messed up like they, we know they messed up, but we also know that a lot of these big companies have really amazing talent in food safety.

And so by calling out where they've messed up, we're helping the industry get better. Hopefully without bashing the major company, because most of these companies are really good. They just make mistakes and companies make mistakes. We're human. Humans are running these companies and they make mistakes.

Francine: And it's also not. There's nothing wrong with being profitable. That's why they're in business.

Matt: Yeah, we should learn that sometime Francine I know We need to talk Okay, well on that note don't eat nor drink poop Yes Even if someone jumps in the river and tells you that the water is fine until they drink a cup of it Don't believe them.

That's correct