Here’s something that no one gave you on your next trip to the grocery store. This week’s research shows that a large proportion of urinary tract infections can be traced back to accidentally contaminated store-bought stools. Escherichia coli bacteria.
Investigators at George Washington University and others tested thousands of samples taken from people with utis. They found that almost one in five diseases may be caused by food E. Coli. The results suggest that contaminated meat is an inappropriate source of these serious diseases, the researchers said.
“These findings highlight zoonotic transmission as an important driver of UTIS,” they wrote in their paper, “they wrote in their paper, published Thursday in the journal Mbio.
Origin of UTI
Utis is one of the most common infections around, and it is estimated that it leads to three million emergency room visits in the US alone each year. Over 80% of utis are caused by E. Coli. These bacteria are found everywhere, including the guts of humans and many animals that we eat regularly, although only certain types can make us sick.
Researchers at George Washington University have been investigating the possibility of eating UTIS for a while.
In 2018, for example, they published a study showing clear evidence that human Utis caused by E. Coli The bacteria were first found in store-bought meat, especially chicken. But the researchers said it was unclear how often Utis might have appeared in food, especially in large metropolitan areas. To help answer this, they met with other researchers at Kaiser Gorellentte Southern California.
Together, they collected a large amount E. Coli Samples from real UTI patients in Southern California and packages of commercial meat, eventually sequencing the genes of more than 5,000 samples. They then developed an algorithm, based on 17 specific markers, to determine whether a particular sample of E. Coli in the beginning it came from animals or people.
All told, they found that 18% of human infections
The Hidden Danger of Meat
The investigators note that their findings are limited to a single, if large, region. So more studies should be done to reduce the magnitude of this issue in other parts of the country. However, given their previous research, it seems likely that contaminated meat plays an important and well-known role in UTIS.
“Urinary Tract infections have long been considered a health problem, but our findings show that they are a food safety problem,” said senior author
The current findings may also help inform future prevention efforts. The most dangerous issues of food living in mortgages often come from chicken and turkey, for example. And people who live in low-income areas are more likely to have foodborne illnesses.
Fortunately, the same tips used to prevent foodborne illness in general should also reduce your risk of these things. That includes buying meat that is safely sealed and won’t leak into other foods, cooking your meat thoroughly, and washing your hands after handling raw food.
