Australians have been assured prepacked lettuce on retail shelves is safe to eat as the number of salmonella cases linked to some products grows.

Fresh Produce Safety Centre technology manager Richard Bennett said consumers shouldn’t worry about potentially tainted lettuce unless it had been sitting in their refrigerators (disclaimer — I gave a talk for this group a couple of years ago; weren’t interested in hard questions).

“Any product on the retail shelf now is fresh, safe and healthy,” Mr Bennett told AAP.

Mr Bennett said Australia was a leader in food safety and systems were usually able to prevent outbreaks of disease.

No, most of it doesn’t get reported.

The Australian Fresh Produce Safety Centre, a bastard child of the leafy greens marketing thingy or whatever they’re called in California, is following the same playbook of saying everything is OK, why are you looking at us?

Consumers deserve better.