[acd10j]

Food poisoning is real, Rotten Cheese and Panner could cause severe food poisoning, Until unless you and me are experts in determining whether aged cheese is still edible, a single ER visit due to food poisoning can eat up all money saved in eating aged cheese.

[kergonath]

I have eaten quite a lot of things on 5 continents. I got food poisoning from a lot of things as well. Plus common stomach bugs every so often. What I have never seen ever is someone getting food poisoning from a piece of cheese. And some of them are nasty even without considering what they can pick up in a fridge.

Hard cheeses are fine if you just scrap one or two millimetres in the worst cases. Soft cheeses are supposed to have a thriving mould population from the beginning, which prevents a lot of nasty things to develop. The riskiest are cheeses you are supposed to eat very young like cottage cheese. These can be aged with the right culture, but it’s unlikely to happen by chance and they get foul very quickly otherwise.

You should be more upset that a simple ER visit could cost you any money at all, to be honest.

[SOLAR_FIELDS]

The thing about cottage cheeses and the like is our evolution is REALLY good at detecting when dairy is bad (as also alluded to in the article). So while bad cottage cheese is probably dangerous, your inbuilt system is immediately going to detect it as rancid and be repulsed to eating it.

[matt-attack]

Yes but what about sour cream?? It’s already sour!

[Broken_Hippo]

Every time I see such a comment, I'm happy I'm no longer covered under the American health care system.

It isn't like I'm going to start playing Food Poisoning Roulette any time soon. But if I happen upon some bad food, there is a limit to the expenses occurred.

[mypastself]

This does not necessarily apply to you, but that system could also encourage making reckless dietary choices with the knowledge others would pay the potential bill.

[Broken_Hippo]

Which you do with any health care system. Your health care premiums aren't really based off of your health alone, but of everyone that health care company covers - plus the costs of hospitals and so on. Those costs, too, include folks that didn't make the best choices.

And overall, I'm OK with this. I'd rather help folks when they need it even if they didn't make perfect choices than leave folks suffering - and make sure their kids aren't growing up watching their parent physically suffer because the parent messed up when they was younger.

[danparsonson]

You think people might carelessly choose to eat spoiled food because they won't have to foot the medical bill? Have you ever had food poisoning before?? It's not a pleasant experience....

[mypastself]

People tend to perform risk-benefit analyses of their actions, even if unconsciously. They also engage in all sorts of risky behavior.

If they determine the benefit of eating something outweighs the risks, they might do it. Reducing the financial part of the equation reduces potential risk. It’s as simple as that.

[danparsonson]

I think that's quite a naive and simplistic view of human nature but let's assume it's all true - what's the benefit of food poisoning? Because one either thinks the food is safe to eat or not; why would someone knowingly poison themselves (assuming they expected to survive)? Do you see what I'm saying? Removing the financial risk still leaves the huge health risk - food poisoning can be deadly, and even if not, enormously unpleasant.

[mypastself]

I’ve actually had food of questionable provenance myself, including oysters bought from a sketchy street vendor in an Asian country - and I’m not even a particularly risk-taking type.

I accepted some degree of health hazard for a pleasant meal. Let’s say someone managed to convinced me I was also at risk of losing a great deal of money in the process. I might have declined the vendor’s offer then…

[veidr]

I'm just commenting so I can find this again, as it pithily exemplifies a certain type of argument (prevalent here, but also elsewhere) that is also performed unconsciously: the meaningless application of some kind of principle in favor of actual reality.

There are now more than 8 billion people on this planet. And many (though not as many as you might think) billions before that.

Not a single one of them has ever decided, "Fuck it, this might give me 2 days of violent vomiting and involuntarily shitting liquid, but our HEALTH CARE system will cover so WHOO HOO YOLO BABY!!!"

[watwut]

Except that somehow Americans are not more healthy nor have less of food poisonings. All that price tag achieves that they afraid of a lot of things that are actually safe.

[OJFord]

What a divide we have in the world, that nice aged cheese can't come from a grocery store, and you might not eat it anyway in case your hospital bill is too high.

[refactor_master]

Chances are though, that you’re significantly more likely to be poisoned by fresh lettuce than old cheese.

[katbyte]

Many places in the world er visits don’t cost anything.

[speedbird]

Would have to be some pretty hard core food poisoning to need hospital.

[hnbad]

Botulism shouldn't be underestimated however you're more likely to get severe food poisoning from re-heated rice than dodgy cheese.

That said, many cheeses that keep well just end up tasting like amonia if you allow them to ripen too long. As a cat owner, that's just a no-go for me.

[pbhjpbhj]

Do you have a scientific source for 'get severe food-poisoning from reheated rice'?

This was a meme in the past causing a lot of rice you be disposed of; is that disposal justified?

[astura]

The concern with rice is the bacteria spores that lives in rice (and pasta) survive the cooking process and multiply rapidly in prepared rice at room temperature. So you just have to store the rice in the refrigerator immediately (which most people do).

https://www.nhs.uk/common-health-questions/food-and-diet/can...

Every few years you get a story like "man dies after eating rice stored on the counter for two weeks." But most people aren't doing that. But some people, I guess, don't understand that cooked rice is a food that requires refrigeration.

[pbhjpbhj]

Thanks for expanding on the issue. Now I need to find out why these spores don't die from being boiled!?

[sBqQu3U0wH]

>a single ER visit due to food poisoning can eat up all money saved in eating aged cheese.

I am so glad I don't live in US.