Food poisoning is becoming a bigger threat than the pandemic and it’s starting to affect everyone, experts say.
Mashable spoke with two experts to understand how food poisoning spreads and how it could impact the global economy.
Dr. Paul Mascarenhas is the director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Infectious Diseases, and he told Mashable, “It is the biggest public health threat in the world today.
If we are not prepared, it will be the greatest economic disaster we have ever seen.”
Dr. Stephen R. Mascarelli, an infectious disease physician and former chief medical officer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said, “We are going to have a pandemic, and it is going to be catastrophic for the world economy.”
Dr Mascareso said the spread of the virus could affect food supplies, health care, food safety and education systems, as well as manufacturing.
Dr Mancini, an epidemiologist at the University at Buffalo School of Public Health, said the virus can be passed from person to person.
“The virus has a very low mortality rate,” he said.
“If we are unable to contain it, the consequences could be catastrophic.”
Dr Michael Mancinelli, an associate professor of epidemiology and public health at Harvard University and the author of the book “The Scourge of Foodborne Illness,” said it is critical that we have strong food safety standards in place to ensure food safety, including requirements for packaging, labeling and labeling of food.
Dr Paul Mancaresi, director of Infectious Disease at the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the NYU School of Medicine, said we need to take the food safety measures necessary.
“The food we eat is the foundation of our health and well-being, and as a society, we have to start taking the steps necessary to protect that,” he told the news outlet.
“This is the most critical moment we have faced in our history.
We have to prepare for what’s coming.”
Foodborne illnesses have been on the rise in the US and elsewhere for years.
Since the start of the pandemics, more than 4 million people have died from foodborne illnesses in the United States.
Mascareli said he believes foodborne infections could be more dangerous than the current pandemic.
He told the outlet that the current outbreak is “worse than what we have seen before.”
“It’s the biggest food-borne illness we’ve ever seen in our entire history,” he explained.
“It has an estimated mortality rate of over 100 times the number of deaths that we saw in the previous pandemic.”
He said the food could be contaminated with the virus and that the virus “is the most common pathogen for humans.”
Mascarenheso, who previously served as the president of the Association of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, said that the food and drink supply is a major part of global economies.
“Food is the backbone of a very rich and growing economy, so any failure to properly protect it is a failure for the entire global economy,” he noted.
Dr Kevin J. Sullivan, an assistant professor of food science and engineering at the School of Food Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said there are a number of ways to prevent foodborne illness.
“For the most part, food has been made safe,” he stated.
“But we are still at the beginning of understanding how food systems work, and the ability to identify those systems, to protect them, and to make changes.”
Dr Sullivan also said the best way to reduce the risk of foodborne infection is to use good sanitation practices.
He said a simple, clean utensil should be the first line of defense.
“This is what you do to prevent infections, not to keep them,” he added.
“So the best approach is to have good sanitation in your kitchen, and good food storage and preparation.”
Dr Patrick M. Phelan, a professor of medicine and nutrition at Tufts University School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, agreed that sanitation and hygiene are critical to reducing the risk.
“There are many ways to protect yourself from a foodborne disease, and we should all do our part to help prevent it,” he wrote on Twitter.
“As with all public health crises, there is a global community response, but we have a lot of work to do.”
Dr Phelanson also noted that it is important to remember that foodborne outbreaks are “local and not global.”
“We don’t know where it is coming from, how it’s coming from and where it’s going,” he pointed out.
“We don, therefore, need to develop strategies to reduce exposure to food-related illnesses.”
Dr Anthony Fauci, professor of environmental health sciences at Harvard Medical School, said it’s important to understand the global impact of food poisoning outbreaks, including the costs.
“We need to understand