Experts: Don't Wash Raw Poultry, Go Straight For Cooking
(CBS) – There's a hidden danger in the kitchen. And it's something most of us do every time we make chicken or our Thanksgiving turkey.
The goal in washing poultry? To get rid of germs. But new research from Drexel University shows that could be backfiring, CBS 2's Roseanne Tellez reports.
"They call it aerosolization," Dr. Jennifer Quinlan says. "You've got this tiny spray, this microscopic spray, that is splashing back."
Quinlan and others have now developed a new campaign called "Don't Wash You Chicken."
CBS 2 went to Loyola Medical Center, where infectious-disease experts demonstrated what happens when you wash a raw chicken. Poultry could have dangerous bacteria like salmonella or campylobacter.
For the demonstration, an expert coated a bird with an ultraviolet gel that simulates germs. After the bird was washed, a blue light was used to track the splash.
Traces of the gel were in the sink, the faucet, way over by the backsplash and even near the paper towel dispenser.
"In the process of washing, we splashed what was on the chicken all around our sink," Paul Schreckenberger, a Loyola University Medical Center microbiologist, says.
And, even after that rinse, the chicken itself is still covered in the gel that simulated germs.
Schreckenberger says the best way to kill germs is to cook them.
"Everything on that surface is going to be destroyed when you cook it," he says.
Germs can live on your countertops for as long as 24 hours. And 2 million people each year get food poisoning from salmonella or other bacterial infections.
