Most companies are probably going to continue their regular food safety procedures, but a few things you can do to reduce some personal risk:
Buy hard, solid veggies and fruits (apples, melons) or ones with rinds (bananas are probably fine). Scrub the peel/rind thoroughly with soap and water before consumption.
The more solid and dense the meat, the less likely it is for contamination to spread very far. Buy your meat in solid cuts, NOT GROUND. Especially not ground chicken rn, salmonella bad.
Cook things thoroughly. Follow guidelines for the internal temperatures meat is supposed to reach and stick to those guidelines. Use a meat thermometer. Make your steaks well done for a while.
I’d stay away from shellfish as a whole if I were you. The diseases you can get from it are some of the nastier ones. No sushi for a while, too. If you have fish, make sure it was frozen following anti-parasitic guidelines and cook thoroughly.
AVOID LEAFY GREENS. This is where we’ve been seeing the most outbreaks lately, so be very careful.
The pregnant, elderly, immunocompromised, and the very young are the ones most at risk in an outbreak. If you are in one of these groups, be extremely cautious and avoid soft cheeses and prepackaged deli meats. Check on friends and family in these groups. Report symptoms of foodborne illness to a doctor so they can report to the state health depts that are still running.
Even with these in mind, remember that most outbreaks of foodborne illness are due to things like improper cooking and storage. Stay safe out there, folks 💙
Just to add to washing fruits:
FUCKING USE SOAP
It sounds like a stupid idea to put something like soap on a fruit but the soap will clear off anything bad, like pesticides or any sort of disease causing thing. The skin will keep the soap from making the rest of the fruit taste bad, and if you rinse it thoroughly enough you shouldn’t even have a problem with soapy fruit. Also, do this even when not eating the skin! If you cut into the fruit, such as cutting up a melon, the knife is going to end up going right through and passing the crud from the outside to the inside on its way.
Even when the government shutdown ends like still wash your fruits with soap when you can.
the ONLY binary category we should be splitting ourselves us into is “graphite embedded in your skin from getting stabbed with a pencil in fourth grade” vs “leadless”
