# Are the CDC warnings about Romaine lettuce unfair?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-cdc-warnings-about-romaine-lettuce-unfair/825026
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [November 24, 2018, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-cdc-warnings-about-romaine-lettuce-unfair/825026 "2018-11-24T20:38:36Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 3
### Author:  [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2018, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-cdc-warnings-about-romaine-lettuce-unfair/825026/41 "2018-11-29T20:58:50Z")
> [@Voyager](#):
>
> I don’t think that is the intent of the standard. You will know the set of grapes which went into the vat from which the wine was produced. That would narrow the search for a bad vine down a lot, especially if another winery also produced bottles with issues. Then you can do the intersection of the vineyards producing the grapes for both bottles.
I think we agree on the intent. The part I was responding to was the idea that a barcode on a specific bottle of wine gives you any useful information. In most cases I imagine that all wine of the same vintage and varietal will be indistinguishable. If there is a problem with any of the bottle you have to recall the entire release because there’s no way to isolate any bottling runs based on the bottle. Even if you could isolate the bottling runs by case you’d still have the problem that tanks have been blended and pumped together often enough that any possible contamination would be across all wine bottled.
It is possible to identify other wines produced by grapes from the same vineyard plot though record keeping, and that would be useful. At that point the volume of fruit or juice purchased would make a huge difference. My sister doesn’t currently get any of that GIS info when she does bulk purchasing, but the grower may have that information. That fruit/juice is often earmarked for a specific wine but not always. They keep some tanks in reserve to be used for blending late into the production cycle where needed so recalls would be huge.
It’s similar to the way ground beef is made, with one bad cow spoiling potentially tons and tons of product. Although with wine the tanks and hoses are cleaned religiously between uses.
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### Author:  [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2018, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-cdc-warnings-about-romaine-lettuce-unfair/825026/42 "2018-11-29T21:14:24Z")
Wine is also typically treated with Campden tablets or other products that will kill E. Coli bacteria.
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### Author:  [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2018, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-cdc-warnings-about-romaine-lettuce-unfair/825026/43 "2018-11-30T00:08:05Z")
> [@Telemark](#):
>
> I think we agree on the intent. The part I was responding to was the idea that a barcode on a specific bottle of wine gives you any useful information. In most cases I imagine that all wine of the same vintage and varietal will be indistinguishable. If there is a problem with any of the bottle you have to recall the entire release because there’s no way to isolate any bottling runs based on the bottle. Even if you could isolate the bottling runs by case you’d still have the problem that tanks have been blended and pumped together often enough that any possible contamination would be across all wine bottled.
The barcode itself does not. It is an index into databases kept at various points of the process, and tracing through them might.
It takes a bit of coding and infrastructure to be able to collect the information you might need. I understand that a small operation can’t afford it, probably. But I could tell when the engineers who tested our parts went to lunch. My knowledge of winemaking is limited to what I picked up on tours in Napa, but the next time I go to Korbel I’ll ask about traceability.
So I’m not saying that everyone does it, or even that everyone should do it, just that it is possible.
> [@](#):
>
> It is possible to identify other wines produced by grapes from the same vineyard plot though record keeping, and that would be useful. At that point the volume of fruit or juice purchased would make a huge difference. My sister doesn’t currently get any of that GIS info when she does bulk purchasing, but the grower may have that information. That fruit/juice is often earmarked for a specific wine but not always. They keep some tanks in reserve to be used for blending late into the production cycle where needed so recalls would be huge.
>
> It’s similar to the way ground beef is made, with one bad cow spoiling potentially tons and tons of product. Although with wine the tanks and hoses are cleaned religiously between uses.
Getting this information costs money, and your sister probably doesn’t have the clout (or the money) to get it. I worked for a pretty big company and it was a pain for us - Cisco which had a lot more volume than we did also got a lot more data.
It’s kind of like insurance. If nothing ever goes wrong implementing full traceability is a waste of money. But really big suppliers probably know that something will go wrong some time, so for them it is worth it. And they can spread the cost over a lot more product.
BTW they have RFID tags for cattle. [Link](https://www.cattlemax.com/cattle-tags-eid-readers) Yeah, a batch of ground beef might have to be recalled, but they could trace the problem back to the cows that went into the ground beef and see what the cause was. And you should also be able to tell which shipments of ground beef don’t have to be recalled. (Something the romaine producers couldn’t do.)
Merlot, microprocessors - in some respects they’re all the same.
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### Author:  [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2018, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-the-cdc-warnings-about-romaine-lettuce-unfair/825026/44 "2018-11-30T22:53:59Z")
> [@jasg](#):
>
> I saw a Tweet the other day from the LRA - Lettuce Retailer Association - telling the CDC to stay in their lane…
An op-ed from a produce business apologist (a.k.a. the Perishable Pundit, Jim Prevor) argues that the number of people sickened by Romaine lettuce in the current outbreak (43 or so) is so low compared to the number of Romaine eaters, that the odds of getting seriously ill from consumption compares favorably to being struck by lightning, being eaten by a rabid pug or somesuch.
He should be writing press releases for dodgy airlines (“Virtually all of Fly-By-Night Airways scheduled flights arrived safely at their destinations today. Sorry about that one that didn’t, but your odds are always terrific when you go with Fly-By-Night!”).
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