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Comment by nhooey | Hacker News Reader

I cut meat on my cutting board all the time, and for years I didn't even really use soap to wash it off. I would just scrub the meat juice off with a brush. Now I use just run-of-the-mill dish soap. The whole idea of having to sterilize everything that meat touches is pushed really hard by the soap companies on TV. I don't think it's necessary to use anything stronger than normal soap.

Also, giving up meat completely isn't easy if you go out to dinner with other people. And it gets exponentially harder the more people you go out with, given the low odds of everyone being vegetarian, or wanting to go to a vegetarian restaurant.

I think that severely reducing meat consumption is a good idea in general, but quitting cold-turkey is pretty inconvenient.

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I tend towards the "that which does not kill me, makes me stronger" approach to sanitization. A good immune system is valuable, and oversanitizing definitely weakens it, because you've had less exposure. Health-care people really are immune(ish) to a vast amount of diseases because they're exposed to them while they're healthy, and they develop defenses against them.

Clean things, sure, but sanitization is overkill because the world is not a sanitary place to begin with. If you're not living in the world when it intrudes, it seems unlikely you'll be prepared. And antibacterial soap is ridiculously excessive for anyone not in healthcare; it all washes down the drain in the end, boosting diseases' resistance to it.

As to meat, I generally have found that less is better, and American diets tend to have a ton. I have doubts that zero is more healthy (and don't bother quoting / linking, I've read tons) than small amounts, much less veganism, but I definitely do better when I keep it pretty low.

I assume this is rare, but the lack of sanitization in this case paralysed a 22 year old woman.

""" Then her diarrhea turned bloody. Her kidneys shut down. Seizures knocked her unconscious. The convulsions grew so relentless that doctors had to put her in a coma for nine weeks. When she emerged, she could no longer walk. The affliction had ravaged her nervous system and left her paralyzed.

Ms. Smith, 22, was found to have a severe form of food-borne illness caused by E. coli, which Minnesota officials traced to the hamburger that her mother had grilled for their Sunday dinner in early fall 2007. """

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/04/health/04meat.html

That's not really a lack of sanitization. That's cross-contamination and / or undercooked food, which puts it on the same level as nomming down on a piece of raw meat; sometimes you get something nasty. Cooking it properly and keeping it on clean surfaces afterwards is essentially perfectly safe.

As to the severity, apparently she got one of the nasty strains of E. Coli, where death isn't exactly uncommon (3-5%)[1]. Ever read the under-cooked meat warnings all restaurants stick on their menu? This is why.

Specifically with respect to the article you linked, did you watch the video?[2] The burgers they made were totally free of E. Coli, because they were fully cooked: only the cutting board, which was apparently wiped (shown by the video, at least) with a sponge, not rinsed, soaped, etc, had any. To which I say shock and awe. I did find it odd that it didn't transfer to the veggies, but meh. You use separate cutting boards to prevent this sort of thing in the first place. If you don't, you're essentially asking for trouble.

[1] http://www.emedicinehealth.com/food_poisoning/page3_em.htm [2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=859ZHzK9_X4

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