What do Kellogg’s Honey Smacks cereal and Salmonella have in common?
Answer: They hang out in the same box.
On June 14, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) issued this advice: If you have a box of Honey Smacks in any size, from any date, open or not, or if you dumped it into another container and are not sure if it’s even Kellogg’s Honey Smacks, but it looks like Honey Smacks, get rid of it. And, clean the container thoroughly.
Honey Smacks is an unlikely place to find Salmonella, but it serves to remind us that one in six people in the U.S. gets sick from eating contaminated food each year. The 1,000 or more reported outbreaks that happen each year reveal the familiar culprits—like Salmonella. It’s tricky—your food doesn’t smell or look any different. You won’t know you have eaten contaminated food until you are vomiting, can’t keep fluids down, running a fever, have diarrhea (that may be bloody), and you get dehydrated.
Salmonella is worse in the summer, can last up to seven days and land you in the hospital. That’s why you need to prevent it.
The CDC says the best way to prevent food poisoning is to follow four simple steps- Clean, Separate, Cook and Chill.
- Clean: Wash your hands and surfaces often.
- Separate: Don’t cross-contaminate.
- Cook: Cook to the right temperate.
- Chill: Refrigerate promptly.
So how does this all apply to Honey Smacks? A lot goes into getting food on to your local grocery shelves. Contamination can happen anywhere along the line from processing and distribution, to during preparation.
By the time a food causes illness, it has already been mishandled in several ways along the food production chain. Once contamination occurs, further mishandling, such as undercooking the food or leaving it out on the counter at an unsafe temperature, can make a foodborne illness like Salmonella more likely.
Salmonella and other food-borne germs can be dangerous. It’s easy to do your part in the prevention of its spread.
For more food safety tips: https://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/keep-food-safe.html