One food safety expert, who asked not to be named, told me, “I would let my kids jump off a cliff sooner than I would let them eat rare hamburger.” That kind of shook me up because I had no idea that it was such a serious problem in the United States.

I participated in the Handwashing Olympics at the Food Safety Summit in Washington, D.C. Hundreds of people lined up to compete in an event that tested the powers of personal hygiene. First, I rubbed my hands—with a little too much relish—with a special germ-indicator cream. Next, I went to three stations to scrub my hands with soap, hot water, and other cleansing agents. At the end, I stepped into a very discrete, curtained area to have them examined under an ultraviolet light that made the germs I missed glow. My hands looked like a Jackson Pollock painting in neon. I had missed alot, and, needless to say, I didn’t win any medals.