text: Mark Bittman (NYT): Seattle Attorney Bill Marler Is "The Guy We Have to Thank" for e. Coli Crackdown | News & City Life | Seattle Met
  Mark Bittman (NYT): Seattle Attorney Bill Marler Is "The Guy We Have to Thank" for e. Coli Crackdown
  7/14/2011 at 12:00pm
  Mark Bittman---longtime New York Times food columnist-turned-food-politics-writer and author of the bestselling cookbook How to Cook Everything---talked to Seattle attorney Bill Marler about the recent E. coli outbreak, which Marler calls the worst E.coli outbreak he's ever seen. (Marler is best known for prosecuting the infamous 1993 Seattle Jack in the Box E.coli case, in which a nine-year-old girl nearly died, and dozens of others were infected, with E.coli from contaminated burgers). Bittman credits Marler with raising awareness of the risk of E.coli contamination and getting US regulatory agencies to pay attention to the issue.
  Marler, Bittman writes,
  has an amazing sense of humor, especially given that half our communication was at 5 a.m. Eastern time/2 a.m. Pacific time (he lives outside Seattle). I asked him whether we are safer eating at home than out. This is a difficult question to answer given how many cases of E. coli (and salmonella, and all the rest) go unreported unless they're part of an outbreak. My instincts tell me it's safer to eat at home, but I asked not only Bill but a few other experts this question, and no one could really be definitive. The closest I got was this e-mail from Marler, which may not be authoritative, but is certainly sensible (and cute!):