Today, Twitter informed me via Associated Press tweet of a recent detainment by the FDA of imported pomegranates by a particular firm due to a multistate outbreak of Hepatitis A linked to their use in multiple organic fruit blends. I clicked on The Associated Press article to read more of the details surrounding this story at which point I learned that the FDA and CDC were able to determine the source of the outbreak due to the particular food's inclusion in similar products. For instance, several different organic health food fruit blends were obtaining their pomegranate seeds from the same Turkish company, Goknur. I found this to be extremely ironic and quite sad that one of the most expensive fruits that is marketed and sold in the United States is the pomegranate and furthermore, unsuspecting consumers were paying a premium for organic foods that in turn gave them a serious viral infection. Why steer clear of nonorganic foods in fear of ingesting pesticides just to pay more for organic foods and become infected with Hepatitis A? There seemed quite a disconnect and I was intrigued by the process in which this has occurred.
After reading the AP article on their own web site sent from the Twitter link, I wanted to see of other reports of this same occurrence so I Googled "FDA pomegranate" to find ten different sources (Yahoo! News, NBC News, Boston Herald and foodsafetynews.com to name a few) on results page one reporting the same story, the first being from the FDA itself.
News for fda pomegranate
natmonitor.com
FDA to detain pomegranate seeds offered for import from Goknur of Turkey
FDA.gov - 11 hours agoThe U.S. Food and Drug Administration will detain shipments ofpomegranate seeds from Goknur Gida Maddeleri Ithalat Ihracat Tic [Goknur ...
- This got me wondering about the details of Hepatitis A and its level of seriousness so I went to Wikipedia and searched "Hepatitis A" where I read about some of the effects on the body as well as the largely Western eradication of the disease via prevention. Lo and behold, the very last subject was regarding cases and the last listed was the most recent, added today which states:
- In June 2013, frozen berries sold by US retailer Costco and purchased by around 240,000 people were the subject of a recall, after at least 118 people were infected with HAV.[35]
The separating element between the story on FDA detainment of pomegranates one like the Three Mile Island meltdown story (CNN) is the gravity of events. The reactor meltdown means radiation leakage for possibly thousands of people as well as contaminated water and soil whereas the source of the contaminated pomegranate seeds was already determined and posed no future threat as it could be avoided. The issue with the reactor meltdown is that at that point ... it was out of the hands of the people to prevent.
The question of "How do you know what you know?" can be interpreted as one of source, "How do you come about finding the things that you know?" or one of validity, "How do you know if what you learned is really true?" The answer lies in the interest of the end-user and how far he or she wants to dig to find it referenced in enough cases to make it more than just a one-off incidence. In this instance, multiple credible news sources were attributed to the broadcasting of this story, all of whom have reputations and obligations to uphold. The only feasible idea as to why this particular story would permeate our preferred search engine, our preferred online encyclopedia and one of the world's biggest forums for social media and still not be true is if it were a case of agenda setting and corruption that would involve the federal government, its agencies and publicly and privately-owned news sources. This is not entirely out of the picture but in weighing its validity and its sources, the offending parties would have to have a serious motivation to commit such acts.Social media can be used to obtain credible information because it is in large, a re-sourcing of information. A re-tweet can be posted by anyone on Twitter but the source is still embedded, they are just helping the information to spread. In such instances, they would normally choose to re-post, re-tweet items that are of personal interest to them. Social media in the regard of credible information is used as a vehicle to transport such ideas. Yes, they are alterable messages, however if the message appears enough times then its consistency will be revealed.ReferencesThe Associated Press (29 June 2013). Retrieved 29 June 2013. http://bigstory.ap.org/article/fda-detain-import-firms-pomegranate-seeds.
CNN. Pump Triggers Three Mile Island Reactor Shutdown, NRC says. Retreived from http://www.cnn.com/2012/09/20/us/pennsylvania-three-mile-island/index.html.Wikipedia (n.d.). Retrieved 29 June 2013. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hepatitis_A.
