Farm to Fatal: Food for Thought
Is our food safe? Would you know if it is? Follow UCLA undergrads as they explore a dozen foodborne outbreaks and their consequences.
In Farm to Fatal, twelve different outbreaks illuminate the biology of foodborne illness, the complexity of modern food safety regulation, and the details of how we make food safe... or fail to. In Winter 2025, UCLA undergrads in the Human Biology and Society major set out to explore the intricacies of food safety in the US. Each group explored an outbreak over the last 30 years, diving into the details of the bacteriology, the illness and the treatments on the one hand, and the insanely complex system of governance, audit, oversight, lawsuits and regulations. Dive into every corner of the food safety world, from e. Coli to Hepatitis A, from South Africa to Arizona, from the challenge of regulating raw milk to the difficulties of cleaning tanker trucks, from the "sewer state" to problem of "organized non-knowledge". Across the episodes students find a new respect for the challenge of governing food, the problems with the existing system, and also the need to defend it.
Farm to Fatal: Food for Thought
The Hidden Cost of Convenience: The 2013 Trader Joe’s Salad Outbreak
How could a quick trip after work to Trader Joe’s turn into a public health crisis? In this episode we investigate the 2013 E. coli outbreak linked to Glass Onion Catering’s prepackaged salads. How did the intersection of contaminated water, industrial farming, and regulatory loopholes create such a deadly outbreak? More importantly—who was supposed to protect us, who failed us, and how could it have been prevented?
In 2013 a simple salad purchase turned into a public health disaster. Across four states on the West coast, thirty three people fell ill and seven of them were hospitalized due to an outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 linked to pre-packaged salads sold as Trader Joe’s. Despite the food safety laws designed to prevent incidents like these, failures at multiple levels from agricultural water testing, to processing plant sanitation, to supply chain oversight—this deadly bacterium was allowed to slip through the cracks. This episode delves into the complex journey of contamination. It begins in the farm fields of Modesto, CA, where antibiotic-laden runoff from industrial cattle farms might have seeded dangerous bacteria into irrigation water. We unpack how industrial farming practices and weak regulatory enforcement turned leafy greens into a recurring vehicle for deadly outbreaks. A deep dive into the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), the evolution of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and the hidden risks of modern food production reveal the systemic flaws that are still putting consumers at risk. Why does E. coli keep popping up in our fresh product? How can we fix a food system setup to prioritize efficiency over safety? Join us as we uncover the biological, political, and economic forces that shape our modern food supply as well as what it means for the future of food safety in the United States.
Produced by Ayesha Ashraf and Anushka Samirah
These podcast episodes were created by members of the 2025 Winter Capstone course in the Human Biology and Society major at UCLA's Institute for Society and Genetics (https://socgen.ucla.edu/). The faculty sponsor is Christopher Kelty. For questions or concerns email ckelty@ucla.edu.