Blog — dr. shawki ibrahim

Official Statement from Dr. Shawki Ibrahim, Ph.D. Environmental Health Sciences and Mareya Ibrahim, Food Safety Expert, in response to Recent E.coli Outbreak with Cut Romaine Lettuce On Friday, April 13th, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) confirmed the cause of a multi-state E.coli O157-H7 related to chopped Romaine lettuce, affecting 35 people in 11 states, hospitalizing 22 and causing kidney failure in 3 victims. This outbreak was the result of cases of eating the lettuce from March 22nd – March 31st, 2018, yet the cause of the outbreak was not confirmed until over 3 weeks after the first illness was...

This is a public service announcement, because the impact of proper food safety practices is so vast. We are greatly concerned by the information being given by thought leaders in the produce and food safety world regarding the efficacy of water alone in cleaning produce. Based on data from FDA.gov and journals such as the Journal of Science and Sustainable Development, it is clear that water and even chlorinated water show much lower than a 1 log reduction of bacteria. This has been corroborated by our own third party studies with Earthbound Farms, the Institute for Food Safety and Micro...