Food Safety: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

"It's more common than you think, and Congress refuses to act." Damn, I feel like I just watched 100 episodes of John Oliver in under 5 seconds

Honestly, it's kind of astounding how many government problems boil down to Congress refusing to pay for the things they say they want done...

"it's more common than you think, and Congress refuses to act" works as a byline for half of this show's stories, honestly

Y'all remember the Pink Sauce lady? Someone once asked if it was FDA regulated, and her response was that it doesn't need to be, because it's a food and not a drug (assuming she thought FDA is short for Federal Drugs Administration).

As a person who's worked in a grocery store for 8+ years, a lot of the safety is put on us low wage hourly workers. The amount of produce I throw away is astounding, and the lack of care customers take when sneezing and coughing RIGHT ON THE FOOD, kids walking up and touching every apple right after they touched the ground. WASH YOUR FRUITS AND VEGGIES EVERY TIME BEFORE EATING.

I think one of the problems is that we only punish companies and not the people running them. Stop just slapping companies with fines and put board members responsible behind bars instead.

There were some VERY INTENSE and specific instructions to John about that blowtorch. You can feel the moment when his brain switch out from joke delivery to "I absolutely need to find the right valve to twist or I'll burn to death"

I really appreciate the fact he turned off both valves in the proper order before setting the blow torch down

I’m an industrial hygienist/health and safety professional and it’s insane how limited we are in power and funding. Things that we warn very easily could lead to disasters are routinely ignored to protect profits, and the sad fact is that they end up spending MORE money fixing their mistakes after the fact! Prevention is almost ALWAYS far cheaper! Stupid short sighted executives.

As someone who has worked directly in the regulatory FDA world for over 20 years, the agency has been completely taken over by industry. Salaries of investigators are currently paid largely by the industry that they attempt to regulate. Investigators that try to do the right thing are crushed by the politically appointed leaders of the agency. The FDA needs to be completely and adequately funded by the people and reset their mission to serve the American people.

15:27 It’s like Panera saw this and went ”alright bring out the killer lemonade”

The way Jack-In-The-Box solved their e-coli problem in the 1990s was not through cleaning up the supply chain or more stringent testing. It was by making each location insure they were getting the patties up to proper internal temps. I'm still a little sad they did not use the slogan I came up with for them: Jack-In-The-Box, we cook the shit out of our burgers !!!

I could totally watch John do an entire segment on the Association Of Sauces And Dressings.

I worked for a company that processed beef and chicken and I'll say this, we had U.S.D.A. Inspectors at the plant and in between shifts the machinery had to be cleaned thoroughly and inspected if the inspector found anything not up to specifications the cleaning crew had to re-wash everything again, delayed the shift start or shut the plant down and sent us home until they were satisfied. They didn't play around.

This has been a huge issue.

Ive been working in the food industry for over 10 years now. I see it all the time. People are a little negligent. Even after covid. It might not seem like much, but avoiding cross contamination and washing hands, and proper dish washing sinks, are all very critical... even if its a small chance mishap. Better safe than sorry. I have an insane immune system. I dont get sick from anything, yet i treat food service as if I'm serving a bunch of immunity-compromised individuals.

The lettuce actually withstood the torch very well.

I work in a private Laboratory that is part of a larger group of labs across the united states that does the testing for environmental, food, and water safety on behalf of the USDA and FDA regulators. We receive all manner of food from raw meat, fruit/veggies, Nuts, dairy, Wine, beer, and really anything you can imagine. These labs are so understaffed they have workers doing 16hrs shifts back to back. Everyone is exhausted, turn over is high. With the amount of new people coming and going (including management) mistakes are high, safety controls are lax due to everyone being tired and no one caring. Food safety is a shit show every step of the way.

As a panera employee.his description of ourr customers is so accurate❤

I work for a medical device company and the FDA standards are extremely stringent. They won't let you launch products without significant review, you need real time stability data, toxicity, performance data, etc far before you submit the product for launch (the review takes months typically) you have at a minimum yearly inspections that go on for days and if the results are bad enough they can shut you down instantly. They do not screw around. It is sad to see that the F in FDA is not nearly as dilligent.