Remember that 24-hour flu you had last year?

Well, there's no such thing as a 24- or 48-hour flu.

There's no such thing as stomach flu.

What you had is likely food poisoning.

When someone gets hepatitis from eating a strawberry, the hepatitis

didn't come from the strawberries. Berries don't have little livers. As Dr. McDougal

liked to ask, when's the last time you heard of someone getting Dutch elm disease or a bad

case of aphids? Just as virtually all-known human pandemics come from animals originally,

so does most food poisoning. Specifically animal feces and that manure runoff can contaminate

sprout seeds, spinach, and other healthy plant foods. Still, that's better than eating the manure

directly.

Animal products, particularly fish and poultry, can be covered in fecal bacteria.

It's so bad that while the U.S. federal government recommends that we wash our fruits

and vegetables, we're not supposed to rinse meat for fear of the viral and bacterial splatter.

It's even been put to the test, and indeed,

washing chicken in the sink under standard kitchen-fosset conditions can spew droplets

containing culturable levels of pathogens throughout the kitchen. Meat is so covered in fecal matter

residue that researchers found more fecal matter in the kitchen on

sponges, dish towels, sink drains, than they found swabbing the toilet.

Even after repeatedly cleaning everything with bleach, it may be safer to lick the rim

of the toilet seat than the kitchen countertop because people aren't preparing chickens

in their toilets.

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