On July 7th shares of Chipotle Mexican Grill were trading below $400 following a tweet by Eric Van Lustbader, author of the Jason Bourne series, indicating that eating at a Manhattan-based restaurant location resulted in the hospitalization of his editor.Chipotle spokesperson Chris Arnold responded: “we are aware of the post made on Twitter, however there …
Media outlets and the Twittersphere are indulging in a feeding frenzy about illnesses possibly linked to Chipotle Mexican Grill locations in New York City, but health officials say no confirmed cases have been reported. 
Chipotle’s corporate spokesman also says the aren’t any reports of illnesses from the burrito chain’s more than 60 locations in the…
On Wednesday, Dec. 9, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) hosted its third-annual Twitter chat using the tag #CDCfoodchat to give consumers tips on keeping holiday meals safe and healthy.
It’s important to remember food safety year-round because about one in six Americans is sickened with foodborne illness every year, and about…
The U.K.’s Food Standards Agency (FSA) has reportedly been systematically checking for Twitter hashtags such as #sick and #barf in order to identify potential foodborne illness outbreaks. According to the agency’s chief scientific adviser, FSA is working with the National Health Service to monitor certain tweets via special software as a way of getting on…
(This article by Advik Shreekumar was published Jan. 6, 2015, by the Harvard Political Review and is reposted here with permission.) On March 23, 2013, the civic organization Smart Chicago launched an ambitious program to enhance the city’s food-safety efforts. Using a mix of statistical techniques and computer science, Foodborne Chicago searches Twitter for complaints…
On Thursday, Dec. 11, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention hosted its second annual Twitter chat using the tag #CDCfoodchat to give consumers tips on keeping holiday meals safe and healthy.
Here are some of the top food safety tips for grocery shopping, preparing your kitchen, thawing meat, safe cooking temperatures, notes on raw…
Social media platforms such as Yelp and Twitter have significantly altered the online landscape for restaurants. Now anyone with an Internet connection and an opinion can broadcast their thoughts to others interested in visiting. But what if public health officials could use Yelp and Twitter to track people mentioning foodborne illnesses online to detect outbreaks…
“With the ubiquitous nature of social media in current society, health and food safety risk communicators should be taking advantage of these platforms to provide information and engage the public,” reads a recent article in the journal Perspectives in Public Health. To help health information providers navigate social media, researchers at North Carolina State University…
On Wednesday, Dec. 18, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the International Food Information Council Foundation and other food safety experts flocked to Twitter with the tag #CDCchat to give tips on keeping holiday feasts safe and healthy.
Read some of the top…
The opportunity to use social media platforms to report and track foodborne illnesses is becoming increasingly feasible as more and more people use social media to discuss the ins and outs of daily life. In April, a few volunteer developers in Chicago launched an app called Foodborne Chicago, which aims to facilitate a connection…
