One bad burger! Are there more?

Still thinking about this weekend's NYT article on how an otherwise healthy 22 year old dance instructor became paralyzed from E Coli after having dinner with her family. She had eaten a burger tainted with E. coli.

A small (but scary) excerpt from the article follows:

"Stephanie Smith, a children’s dance instructor, thought she had a stomach virus. The aches and cramping were tolerable that first day, and she finished her classes. Stephanie Smith, 22, was paralyzed after being stricken by E. coli in 2007. Officials traced the E. coli to hamburger her family had eaten. 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........."

"Ms. Smith’s reaction to the virulent strain of E. coli was extreme, but tracing the story of her burger, through interviews and government and corporate records obtained by The New York Times, shows why eating ground beef is still a gamble. Neither the system meant to make the meat safe, nor the meat itself, is what consumers have been led to believe.

“Ground beef is not a completely safe product,” said Dr. Jeffrey Bender, a food safety expert at the University of Minnesota who helped develop systems for tracing E. coli contamination. He said that while outbreaks had been on the decline, “unfortunately it looks like we are going a bit in the opposite direction.”

Food scientists have registered increasing concern about the virulence of this pathogen since only a few stray cells can make someone sick, and they warn that federal guidance to cook meat thoroughly and to wash up afterward is not sufficient. A test by The Times found that the safe handling instructions are not enough to prevent the bacteria from spreading in the kitchen."

Burgers made with 100% beef (whoever thought I'd be saying anything good about a Bubba burger, Marty?) and fewer processed parts as well as safe handling practices may be an important part of protecting yourself if you are still going to eat burgers... makes me worry! But so did the spinach scare....

Sticking with the vegetarian option, though.....
Let me know if you still feel ok eating burgers that you have NO idea where the meat comes from after reading this article. In the burger that paralyzed Ms. Smith, the "meat", made from a mix of slaughterhouse trimmings and a mash-like product derived from scraps that were ground together at a plant in Wisconsin, came from four slaughterhouses from the US and South America, all of which had little or no testing. While I don't want to discuss the processing here, (for fear of upsetting the queasy) you MUST read the article to learn about the contamination that can go on under these circumstances.

I'd be interested in your thoughts. Here is the full article. Please read it!
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/04/health/04meat.html