E.Coli: The Mystery Romaines

Remember when you had really nasty food poisoning at the same time grocery stores were issuing recalls and restaurants were taking items off their menus? Ever wonder why outbreaks of Salmonella. E. coli. or Listeria make headlines at least once a year? Well, let’s uncover the secret together in E. coli: The Mystery Romaines.Foodborne illnesses break out across the world all the time. Does it have to do with unsafe growing? Transportation problems? Unsanitary grocery store habits? What if we were to tell you that it is not that simple. Rather, there is an innate system that is inevitable and ensures that the current rate of foodborne illness outbreaks is unlikely to change. What is this mysterious system? Institutionalized non- knowledge.  Listen in as we explore the outbreak of E. coli in Romaine Lettuce between the years of 2018 and 2020 and delve deeper into how a string of events spanning three years reveal how the systems in control of dealing with outbreaks seem powerless in the face of these pathogens. We will learn what E. coli is, what happened during these outbreaks, how institutionalized non- knowledge complicates these events, and how real change can be made in the future. Come along on this journey as we explore the eternal, systemic mystery of foodborne pathogens.Produced by Ayaan Ekram, Shyla Maharaj and Iris Qi These podcast episodes were created by members of the 2025 Winter Capstone course in the Human Biology and Society major at UCLA's Institute for Society and Genetics (https://socgen.ucla.edu/). The faculty sponsor is Christopher Kelty. For questions or concerns email [email protected].