I’d rather have microbiologically safe food.

Health officials say 37 people have E. coli in Washington state and Oregon amid an outbreak tied to Chipotle restaurants in the Northwest, an increase from 22 cases reported earlier.

Washington health officials are still testing samples from people who have fallen ill in Clark, Cowlitz, Island, King and Skagit counties to see if they all have the same form of the potentially deadly illness.

Officials say most of those sickened by E. coli have eaten at the Mexican food chain.

Nine people in Washington and three in Oregon have been hospitalized, but no one has died. People with E. coli connected with the outbreak have ranged in age from 5 to 60.

Dr. Scott Lindquist, state epidemiologist, says knowing the type of E. coli that’s sickened nearly two dozen people will help officials determine the exact source of the illness.

Food from six Chipotle stores connected with the outbreak is being tested. Lindquist says officials may know by Wednesday what type of food tests positive for the same microorganism. They’ve asked Chipotle to turn over information about its food suppliers so officials can determine where the product came from.

Meanwhile, Chipote is taking a hit on its antibiotics stance.

Dan Charles of NPR writes that when you’re a nationwide food company, it can be tough to live up to your own lofty marketing slogans.

Chipotle claims to serve only “food with integrity.”

That’s not the same as microbiologically safe food.

Chipotle is also having difficulty living up to another claim: Its promise to sell only meat that’s “antibiotic-free” — or “produced without the use of antibiotics.”

It’s an increasingly popular label among consumers. Chipotle has ridiculed its drug-using competitors with catchy online videos featuring cartoon versions of big meat factories, where machines inject animals with drugs that turn them grotesquely plump.

In reality, though, Chipotle’s hard line on antibiotics isn’t quite as uncompromising as the ads make it seem. The company’s suppliers can, in fact, use these drugs.

“Under our protocol, if an animal is sick and needs to be treated with antibiotics, then it’s treated with antibiotics, but then it’s removed from our program,” says Chris Arnold, Chipotle’s director of public relations.

That animal is sold to someone else, who usually pays less for the animals than Chipotle does. And Chipotle can say that its animals never get antibiotics.

“It’s easier to explain to people,” Arnold says.

Now, though, Chipotle is being forced to do a bit more explaining, because it’s running into some trouble living up to its marketing slogans: It’s running into a pork shortage.

A lot of farmers don’t want to raise pigs the way Chipotle demands. It’s not so much because of restrictions on antibiotics. Chipotle also requires suppliers to let pigs root around outdoors or in buildings with dirt floors.

So to get enough pork, Chipotle has turned to a British supplier, named Karro.

And Karro has a different policy on antibiotics. It treats pigs when they get sick, and when they recover, those pigs go right back into the regular pork supply.

Some will become Chipotle’s carnitas. Chipotle restaurants that serve pork from this supplier will have a little sign explaining how that pork is different.

Actually, the pork itself isn’t different at all. There shouldn’t be traces of antibiotics in any of it.

Veterinarian Gail Hansen points out that such residues are against the law in all meat, “so you’re not eating antibiotic-laden meat.”