My friend Marty will think this is hilarious, but I’m a bit of a fancier of words.

Really.

Except I have a habit of using an apt sounding word that means something totally different from what I was trying to convey. Marty has been making fun of that quirk for 25 years, going back to our university newspaper days. Fortunately, the computer dictionary has helped.

So has Amy. She’s really sharpened my word usage and helped me become a better writer. One of Amy’s greatest pleasures is identifying when people mix up it’s and its.

So when a wire story came out this morning with the lede,

“As Canada grapples with a deadly outbreak of listeriosis, a leading food safety expert says the federal government has not done enough to educate pregnant women and seniors about the potential dangers of eating deli meats.???”

I went a bit nuts.

I would never say that anyone needs to be educated. It’s arrogant. Sure, I’m perceived as arrogant about lots of things, but on this I’m clear: provide information, preferably in a compelling manner, and individuals will decide whether they want to be educated or not. I’m writing a paper about this. I’ve brought students to tears for using the educate people line.

???"Maybe we need warning labels (on the food), because the message isn’t getting out there," said Powell, an associate professor of food safety at Kansas State University.???"

The Health Canada response was typically bureaucratic.

"There are a number of food safety tips and fact sheets and a lot of consumer education on this," said Paul Duchesne of Health Canada.

Show me the data. Show anyone the evaluation you’ve done with your big budgets to ensure Canadians at risk are aware. Demonstrate the effectiveness of your fact sheets and consumer education which are best used as a sleep aid.

Even the U.S. Centers for Disease Control has publicly admitted, new strategies are required to reach people about food safety issues. As I said earlier this year,

"The CDC data show existing efforts to reduce fodborne illness have stalled. We need new messages using new media to really create a culture that values microbiologically safe food."

It’s not like this stuff is hard. We wrote a paper on it last year.

Powell, D.A., Surgeoner, B.V., Wilson, S.M. and Chapman, B.J. 2007. The media and the message: Risk analysis and compelling food safety information from farm-to-fork. Aust. J. Dairy Tech. 62(2), 55-59.

Abstract
The potential for stigmatization of food is enormous. Well-publicized outbreaks of foodborne illness through traditional and new media demonstrate the rapid and dependent interactions between science, policy and public perception. Current risk management research indicates that it is essential for risk managers from farm-to-fork to demonstrate they are reducing, mitigating or minimizing a particular foodborne risk. Those responsible must be able to effectively communicate their risk reduction efforts in multiple media and to provide evidence that these efforts are actually reducing levels of risk.

Guess the folks at CFIA didn’t get that paper. A well-meaning staffer at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency sent me an e-mail the other day, stating,

“The Media Monitoring Team here at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency has been asked by our Director to start monitoring reputable food safety related blogs.
 
“I was wondering if you would happen to have a prepared list of any of these sites, and, if so, if you would be willing to share these with us?”
 
Sure. Always ready to help the government when asked. I told him barfblog.com and marlerblog.com. The other posers just run headlines.

But maybe I’m just a crazy Kansas-type. Jennie Garth, who is reprising her role as Kelly Taylor on a new 90210, enlightened the world as to why the new "90210" is likely to resonate with young viewers.

"It’s going to reflect teenagers as they are. It’s not going to sugarcoat it. You know teenagers are teenagers no matter if they live in Beverly Hills or if they live in crazy Kansas somewhere. All the kids are the same. They’re going through the same elemental issues and problems."