Prof. Jeff Farber spoke to Global News for stories appearing on May 10 and 12 about whether Canadians should be concerned about eating romaine lettuce following an E. coli outbreak from Arizona lettuce.

The stories follow a May 2 CNN story that featured Farber talking about why lettuce is often the culprit behind illness outbreaks linked to E. coli bacteria.

Director of the Canadian Research Institute for Food Safety at U of G, Farber discussed how E. coli outbreaks occur. He said much consumer confusion could be avoided if it were easier to trace products to their source. Without such tracing, he said, it’s difficult for federal officials to issue a recall.

Farber formerly worked at Health Canada, where he was director of microbial food safety and helped develop federal food safety policies. He heads the U of G master’s program in food safety and quality assurance.