Originally Posted by crimgoddess
I am still not convinced.
The more common types of food poisoning involve contamination viaimproper handling by someone who hasn't washed their hands after going to the bathroom or touching other food products,or are sick/infected with something themselves. This really doesn't affect whether the food being consumed is a meat or vegetarian product. This is especially the case if the food is left out in room temperature, as bacteria tend to flourish in that environment.
Other types of bacteria are more specific to meat- so cutting it out of your diet MIGHT decrease your chance of being sick due to that particular bacteria (such as Salmonella, which is indeed the most common), but many of the other types of food poisoning that are caused by meat are also found in many veggies and fruits (such as E. Coli). Part of the problem is that there aren't necessarily reliable numbers collected in terms of what food causes the most incidences of food poisoning, because generally most people who become ill with food poisoning believe it to be the flu or a virus, and are not tested. This is especially true in the case of vegetarians, as the myth persists that food poisoning is exclusively a meat or seafood thing.
Buit in the end, that is all pretty insignificant. What I am getting at more, however, is that becoming a vegan or vegetarian out of fear is, in my humble opinion, is possibly a step in the wrong direction as opposed to a step in the right one. Yep- people should definitely eat what they want and make their own decisions- I personally don't eat meat because of moral reasons, as the thought of eating the flesh of an animal is enough to make me ill. But, if you are doing so for fear of being sick, you are just avoiding the main issue, which is the fear itself- not what you eat.
The fear can be dealt with in much more productive ways, such as fixing the thinking errors that cause it in the first place, and make avoiding certain foods such an attractive option. That is a slow process, but in the end I think it wields more positive results.
*amber*