Well, I agree with those posters who scorn "deli meats" based on their quality (or lack thereof.) I far prefer to slice up my own chicken/ham/roast beef etc. Plus, it's cheaper! Barnmom does make a good point, regarding local meats having less potential for mishandling, etc. But I'd like to see a study or three weighing the points. Locally raised may have fewer possibilities for exposure, but are there also fewer points of inspection? I would like to see, for example, how the incidences of food borne illnesses compare, statistically, between folks who raise their own chickens for meat/egg consumption and folks who buy at the store. My point is not that store bought IS better...I just won't buy into the popular idea that local/natural/organic/more expensive/small farm raised foods are better just because they are local/natural/organic/more expensive/small farm raised foods. People have died of food borne illnesses since human beings first ate food...

On our Panama Canal cruise last year on a Celebrity ship, you could not walk into any dining area without sanitizing. There were machines at every door and if you walked past one, a porter would hold out a giant squirt bottle of the stuff. A serious Novovirus outbreak typically results in the ship being emptied, and the cruise cancelled or on hold while the ship is scrubbed top to bottom. Shigellosis is another outbreak that will clear an entire ship. Nasty stuff, I was deathly ill back in 1979 after a trip to Mexico City (a private land tour) where I picked up Shigella. I was hospitalized for a week and out of work for several months. Jodi-

What anguish I read these comments with. My beloved Maine Coon Cat at age ten gradually stopped eating after his requisite vaccinations. He gradually lost a third of his weight. I took him to the vet. Blood work was done. Palpations were done. He stopped eating, or, as far as I could tell, drinking. I was distraught, and, finally, on a weekend took him to the Pet hospital, where he is now. After reading many of these comments, I am very afraid. He is ten years old and we have had him since he was three weeks old. He is laid-back, thoughtful, and has command of much vocabulary. How can we get along without our beloved cat? He is to have an ultrasound tomorrow, and I shudder at what the news might be. . .

First of all the overly wet cheese you experienced a couple of months back was in no way related the present findings. Secondly the surface mold on your present wheel has nothing at all to do with lysteria. That is caused by air getting to the surface of the cheese. Blue mold grows when exposed to air, which is why holes are punched in the cheese after it is formed into wheels, to allow air to get in so the mold can grow. Either the person who hand wrapped the cheese wasn't careful enough, or when you re wrapped the cheese you didn't take enough care to make sure the foil was firmly in contact with the cheese. The reason they found lysteria in the cheese is because one of the farmers whose cows supplied the milk for the cheese was not keeping a close enough eye on his cow to notice when one was sick. Lysteria can cause still birth or abortion in a cow and since milk production depends on healthy cows having calves, no farmer wants lysteria anywhere near his dairy herd. I am told that the milk comes from dairy farmers within this county....so we don't deal with big tankers of milk from California. Lysteria in aged cheeses has been a subject of controversy for many many years. Cany lysteria bacteria present in cheeses aged 60 days or longer at a temperature above 35 degrees is rendered in active or killed during that time....but it seems that if it was ever present it is still detectable. This has been an ongoing war with makers of fine cheeses and the FDA. Imported Romano was recently recalled and Blue Bell had a huge recall of their ice cream a little while ago> I get more than a little irritated by government agencies that are sending alarms about cheese when no illnesses have been reported and that same government allowing the presence of hormones in our fluid milk and meat> I wish I could get my hands on some of that recalled cheese....I'll bet it's cheap....and just as good as any ever made!