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スープにハエが入っている
スープにハエが入っているじゃないか!
今年の夏は、雪印乳業の食中毒事件に始まり、
異物混入事件の報道が相次いだ。
しかしそれらの報道では重要な点が
見落とされていたのではないか…。
Waiter, There's a Fly in My Soup
By SCOTT T. HARDS
It happened to me at home. As I raised the scrumptious-looking slice of pizza to my lips, my
eyes became riveted on the small, cheese-encrusted piece of ground beef near the tip. Wait, that's not ground beef! I howled, "Yuck! There's a baked fly on my pizza!"
"Don't worry," joked my father, "A little extra protein for you!" It's too bad that Japan
hasn't been able to regard the recent string of
food contamination news with the same calm
humor.
Of course, the problem that started everything was no laughing matter at all, but a genuine
public health crisis. Snow Brand milk products' contaminated milk sickened thousands of
people and many required hospitalization. The company's lies as to what had happened further fueled public anger. No doubt this laid the groundwork for what was to follow.
A fly in a can of tomato juice. A lizard in a can of corn. A caterpillar in a jar of
kimchi. A bee (still alive!) in a bag of bread. A dead cockroach, too. We also saw reports of
non-organic items invading food. Rubber shards in cheese. A bolt in a can of meat sauce.
The list goes on and on. These incidents were reported by the media as if each was a national
health crisis calling into question the safety of the nation's food supply.
Learning from Snow Brand's utterly disastrous handling of their problems, manufacturers quickly announced recalls of the affected food products, costing them millions of yen.
Food contamination is nothing new, of course. It's just that up to now, if a consumer reported
a problem, the company would apologize and replace the product, and that would be the end of the
story. But it was the Snow Brand crisis that gave the media a new toy to play with, and they
suddenly began reporting things that they never have bothered to mention before.
What concerned me the most was that none of the reports pointed out a very crucial fact:
Bacterial poisoning of milk is not only invisible, it's virtually guaranteed to make you sick.
That's a huge problem. A bug in your food, however, while quite disgusting, is easy to spot and, to be perfectly honest, can be safely eaten, as my father joked years ago (just ask any frog
or bear about the nutritional benefits of eating insects!).
This is not to say that I don't care if bugs are getting into our canned foods. Of course I do.
But what concerns me is when manufacturers start unnecessarily recalling products at huge cost
when it happens to preserve image.
Not only will this lead to higher prices on food (such costs are always passed on to consumers), but some firms may also choose to employ pesticides in their processing plants to
lower the risk. While we may end up bug-free, we'll be eating more chemicals, and that's
probably worse than the alternative.
Insect invasions are a routine part of life. No picnic would be complete without its ants and
flies, right? Let's hope that this imagined crisis has already run its course. Bon appetit!
It happened to me at home. As I raised the scrumptious-looking slice of pizza to my lips, my
eyes became riveted on the small, cheese-encrusted piece of ground beef near the tip. Wait, that's not ground beef! I howled, "Yuck! There's a baked fly on my pizza!"
"Don't worry," joked my father, "A little extra protein for you!" It's too bad that Japan
hasn't been able to regard the recent string of
food contamination news with the same calm
humor.
Of course, the problem that started everything was no laughing matter at all, but a genuine
public health crisis. Snow Brand milk products' contaminated milk sickened thousands of
people and many required hospitalization. The company's lies as to what had happened further fueled public anger. No doubt this laid the groundwork for what was to follow.
A fly in a can of tomato juice. A lizard in a can of corn. A caterpillar in a jar of
kimchi. A bee (still alive!) in a bag of bread. A dead cockroach, too. We also saw reports of
non-organic items invading food. Rubber shards in cheese. A bolt in a can of meat sauce.
The list goes on and on. These incidents were reported by the media as if each was a national
health crisis calling into question the safety of the nation's food supply.
Learning from Snow Brand's utterly disastrous handling of their problems, manufacturers quickly announced recalls of the affected food products, costing them millions of yen.
Food contamination is nothing new, of course. It's just that up to now, if a consumer reported
a problem, the company would apologize and replace the product, and that would be the end of the
story. But it was the Snow Brand crisis that gave the media a new toy to play with, and they
suddenly began reporting things that they never have bothered to mention before.
What concerned me the most was that none of the reports pointed out a very crucial fact:
Bacterial poisoning of milk is not only invisible, it's virtually guaranteed to make you sick.
That's a huge problem. A bug in your food, however, while quite disgusting, is easy to spot and, to be perfectly honest, can be safely eaten, as my father joked years ago (just ask any frog
or bear about the nutritional benefits of eating insects!).
This is not to say that I don't care if bugs are getting into our canned foods. Of course I do.
But what concerns me is when manufacturers start unnecessarily recalling products at huge cost
when it happens to preserve image.
Not only will this lead to higher prices on food (such costs are always passed on to consumers), but some firms may also choose to employ pesticides in their processing plants to
lower the risk. While we may end up bug-free, we'll be eating more chemicals, and that's
probably worse than the alternative.
Insect invasions are a routine part of life. No picnic would be complete without its ants and
flies, right? Let's hope that this imagined crisis has already run its course. Bon appetit!
Shukan ST: October 6, 2000
(C) All rights reserved
chu.htm
- (見出し)Waiter, there's a fly in my soup!
- レストランでよくある苦情の決まり文句。冗談の出だしにもよく使われる。
- scrumptious-looking
- おいしそうな
- became riveted on
- に釘付けになった
- cheese-encrusted
- チーズに覆われた
- ground beef
- 牛ひき肉
- tip
- 先端
- howled
- わめいた
- Yuck!
- うぇっ!
- protein
- タンパク質
- regard with the same calm humor
- についても、同じように落ち着いた、ユーモアある態度をとる
- recent string of
- 最近の一連の
- food contamination
- 食物汚染
- was no laughing matter
- 笑い事ではなかった
- genuine
- 正真正銘の
- public health crisis
- 公衆衛生に関する危機
- Snow Brand
- 雪印乳業
- sickened
- 気持ちを悪くさせた
- hospitalization
- 入院
- further fueled
- さらにをあおった
- laid the groundwork for
- のもととなった
- what was to follow
- その後に続くもの(さまざまな異物混入事件の報道)
- lizard
- ヤモリ
- caterpillar
- ガの幼虫
- cockroach
- ゴキブリ
- non-organic items
- 生物でないもの
- invading
- に侵入してくる
- Rubber shards
- ゴム片
- bolt
- ねじくぎ
- national health crisis calling into question
- が問題になるような国民の健康の危機
- food supply
- 食糧供給
- utterly disastrous handling of
- 全くひどいへの対応
- manufacturers
- 製造業者
- recalls
- 回収
- affected
- 問題のあった
- replace
- 取り替える
- never have bothered to mention before
- 以前は取り上げさえしなかった
- What concerned me the most was that
- 私が一番心配したのはということだ
- crucial
- 非常に重要な
- Bacterial poisoning
- 細菌による中毒
- (is)virtually guaranteened to make you sick
- を飲んだ人は間違いなく気分が悪くなる
- bug
- 昆虫
- disgusting
- 気持ち悪い
- spot
- 見つける
- nutritional benefits
- 栄養面での利点
- insects
- 昆虫
- preserve image
- イメージを守る
- (are)passed on to
- に転嫁される
- employ
- 使用する
- pesticides
- 殺虫剤
- processing plants
- 加工工場
- end up bug-free
- 虫はいなくなる
- chemicals
- 化学薬品
- alternative
- もう一つの選択肢(虫などが混入しているかもしれないこと)
- routine part of life
- 生活上よくあること
- has already run its course
- 終わりの時期が来た
- Bon appetit!
- 十分に召し上がってください。