Who do I call/write?

[Mcqueen Fans]

While I agree that housekeeping should have done a better job on the room and letting management know is the only way things will improve, I can't imagine living with toenails in my room for an extended period of time. Even without small children, I would not have wanted that. I would have gotten some kleenex, picked them up and disposed of them.

Thats what I was thinking! I would have never left them there the whole time. I would of had to have a lot of kleenexes, but I would have gotten rid of them. And washed my hand really good!

 

[CleveRocks]

I have had food poisoning, and I got it from shrimp served at one of my best friend's house. There were 75 people there, all ate the shrimp, and only I got sick....and man, was I sick. Three days in the hospital sick....

I'm sorry you were so sick, but your logic is just laughable! If 1 out of 75 people got sick after eating a meal, then it couldn't possibly have been the fault of the meal.

But on a lighter note, I love your Billy Joel quote ... used to be the text on my first screensaver years ago.

 

[SueM in MN]

Here's a link to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website that tells all you might want to know about foodborne outbreaks, plus some things you might not want to know. The CDC is the agency that actually keeps the statistics about foodborne outbreaks.
Most foodborne illnesses have a much longer incubation period than people think. People tend to think about the last food they ate within the last few hours and blame that - even when they have a specific diagnosis of something that takes 12-72 hours after eating the food before symptoms begin.

I was in Public Health for many years and did lots of Foodborne Outbreak investigations. The investigators don't just guess what food was the problem (although a lot of times, people said their doctor had told them he/she 'knew' what food it was by their symptoms; the doctors usually turned out to be wrong).
After questioning sick and well people to see what they ate, all the information is entered into a computer data base to calculate the odds that any particular food caused the problem. The computer compares the ill people who ate something with the well people who ate the same thing and calculates the odds for each food having been the problem. Not everyone who ate the 'problem food' will get ill, but for a situation where 75 people ate the same thing and only one became ill, the odds that food was the problem are out of the realm of possibility.
Before doing the odds calculations, we usually tried to guess how it would turn out. I remember a wedding where a lot of ill people had eaten chicken and very few well people had. It turned out that the problem was the gravy that many people put on their chicken (figured out by calculating the odds ratio, which was higher for gravy or chicken and gravy than it was for just chicken).
When we had the gravy tested, the spices in it were contaminated. It also turned out the the cooks at the wedding had not followed the gravy cooking directions - it said to start out with cold water and bring it to a boil. They tried to hurry the process by starting with microwaved warm water. When we got the dry gravy mix and the one we cooked using their process tested, both were contaminated with the same germ the patients had. When we cooked a batch according to the product directions, the germs were killed.

 

[dqpowell]

Most foodborne illnesses have a much longer incubation period than people think.

People tend to think about the last food they ate within the last few hours and blame that - even when they have a specific diagnosis of something that takes 12-72 hours after eating the food before symptoms begin.

I was in Public Health for many years and did lots of Foodborne Outbreak investigations. The investigators don't just guess what food was the problem (although a lot of times, people said their doctor had told them he/she 'knew' what food it was by their symptoms; the doctors usually turned out to be wrong).

Sue, thank you for lending the perspective of somebody who has actually done contaminated food investigations. All the stuff quoted above from your post are the main points I've been trying to put across in this discussion. I'll take the word of a food-borne illness investigator over an ER doc's any day when it comes to the question of the sources of food-borne illnesses, and the doc's word when it comes to treatment of such illnesses.

David

 

[jak07]

I just read this whole thread to my husband who has worked with food for 15+ years and is certified in food preparation, has to take yearly food preparation courses and universal precaution courses. While he agrees with SOME of your statements David, he has too disagree with other statements. Just know that in fact you can start to see some symptoms early. It isn't rare either!!!!! While the full blown would be around 12 hours.

To the people who are worried about Boma and CP. I have eaten at both numerous times. While I didn't think CP was all that wonderful, we didn't get sick. We ate at Boma in august and it was wonderful!!!!!!!

 

[dqpowell]

Just know that in fact you can start to see some symptoms early. It isn't rare either!!!!! While the full blown would be around 12 hours.

Sigh... What do those statements even mean? Specifically, what does "some symptoms" mean? And when did I say you can't see symptoms "early?" All I said is that less than 8 hours is rare. "Rare" is a relative term, not an absolute. It means that when compared to all "food poisoning" cases, those with symptoms appearing less than 8 hours post-consumption are atypical. i.e., They don't happen nearly as often as cases in which symptoms appear after 12 hours or more. The important corollary is: people often mistakenly associate their most recent meal with the cause of the illness, when in reality, it was a previous meal that caused the problem. On one hand we have people who think symptoms appearing in fewer than 8 hours is common (the opposite of "rare.") On the other hand, we have a perfectly rational explanation for this false assumption -- they're incorrectly assuming the most recent meal was what caused their illness.

Look, I'm done arguing now. Really. This is just too tedious and repetitive. If you disagree, fine... disagree. Somebody who has worked actually doing public health investigations into contaminated food has commented... which is good enough for me.

David

 

[jak07]

What do you mean...What does it mean? It means exactly what others have tried to point out to you too! Someone posted the results they found after YOU asked them to and it still wasn't good enough for you.

Really? You are really leaving this time? You said that a while back and yet you are still here arguing.

 

[jak07]

To the op...I am sorry you had a problem with housekeeping.
Poor housekeeping seems to be the norm there lately. We were there at the end of August and had housekeeping problems too. He came to my door and took the towels but never brought us clean ones. Another day the trash hadn't been emptied and the room needed to be vacuumed. The housekeeper didn't speak English so I had to call down there.

I hope you hear back from Disney.