Today, finally, I’m seeing the FDA explanation of how those Jensen Farms cantaloupes from Holly, Colo., were contaminated with listeria. Had the contamination occurred in the fields, I was prepared to consider the farm not directly responsible. However, it appears the cantaloupes were infected in the packing house, under conditions that should not have existed. That would lay the blame squarely on Jensen Farms while exonerating other farms in the area. Good news for a crop that is huge in that part of Colorado.
What are “conditions that should not have existed?” Does that mean there are huge piles of crap lying around and the cantaloupes are being thrown into them? Does it mean the floor of the room where the cantaloupe are being stored is littered with used heroin needles? Does it mean they train rabid ex-experimental lab monkeys to sort the cantaloupe? Is Management pissing on the cantaloupe from the catwalk over the pit where the monkeys sort them?
What the hell is going on in there?
Read the linked story. Standing water on the floor; old, dirty, hard-to-clean equipment; trucks that sat around at cattle stockyards. Also melons not properly chilled. I don’t think there were any monkeys involved, but it’s rumored that a lemur was spotted in one of the trucks …