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Paul Sakuma / AP file
Members line up for registers at a Costco warehouse store in Mountain View, Calif. Purchase records are being used more frequently by public health officials investigating outbreaks of foodborne illness.
If you have a warehouse membership card in your wallet or a supermarket shopper tag on your key chain, you might regard it as a good way to save money. But public health officials say it may be an even better way to save lives.
More local health departments -- along with state and federal investigators -- are relying on the detailed information about what went in consumers’ shopping carts to track down outbreaks of foodborne illness, experts say.
Take the outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 bacteria in organic spinach and spring mix salad greens that sickened 33 people in five states last fall, including new mother Erica Duerr, 32, of North Tonawanda, N.Y., and her mother-in-law, Beth Duerr, 60.
Erica Duerr already had been sick for nine days when Beth Duerr was struck with gastrointestinal symptoms so severe she had to be rushed to a local emergency room. That’s when local health department officials called, seeking her shopper card numbers.
“They went to the hospital and they got her info,” says Erica Duerr, a nurse who had just given birth to her second child. “They were actually able to track down where it came from.”
Data from Beth Duerr and others pointed to contaminated greens sold by Wegmans, a small Northeast grocery chain, but produced by State Garden of Chelsea, Mass. Seattle food safety lawyer Bill Marler sued the firm on the Duerr families' behalf.
Identifying exactly which products were purchased by victims of food poisoning has become a standard tool for public health investigators, said officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“We are definitely supportive of the use of shopper cards during these outbreak investigations,” said Casey Barton Behravesh, deputy chief of the CDC’s outbreak and prevention branch of the division of foodborne, waterborne and environmental diseases. “The product, the flavor, the lot code, the best by date: That is all tracked with these purchases.”
The CDC estimates that 48 million Americans get foodborne illnesses every year, 128,000 of them are hospitalized and 3,000 die.
Store cards are a rich trove for epidemiologists, who often are trying to track down suspect food a month or so after it was consumed because of the lag between when an illness strikes and when it gets reported, said Bill Keene, a senior epidemiologist with the Oregon Public Health Division. His state has been a leader in using shopper card data, along with Minnesota, but others are joining in, Keene said.
“We rely on people’s memories, which are quite fallible, and on our interviews, which are quite fallible,” Keene told NBC News. “Shopper club cards are a good source of finding out what people ate.”
Identifying the source of an outbreak early and accurately can get product off the shelves faster and point doctors toward the best treatment for victims, experts said.
The push appears to have begun back in 2009, when investigators were stumped after an outbreak of salmonella linked to salami and other deli meats sickened 272 people in 44 states. It was only when officials with Costco warehouse stores cooperated with health officials to review membership data that the source was pinpointed: pepper-crusted Italian-style meats made by Daniele International Inc.
Costco has been notifying consumers about food and other products recalls for safety reasons since the late 1990s, said Craig Wilson, the company’s vice president for food safety and quality assurance. But now, they’re being called on by public health officials at every level.
“It happens a couple times a week,” said Wilson. “It’s getting to be more of a norm.”
Most recently, CDC officials say they have been using shopper cards to investigate an outbreak of salmonella Heidelberg that has sickened at least 128 people in 13 states since June. The illnesses appear to be tied to poultry products from Foster Farms, a West Coast poultry producer.
The reasons may be obvious. About 80 percent of U.S. consumers belong to a shopper loyalty card program, and the average household now participates in more than six shopper programs, according to a report by the Food Marketing Institute.
Nearly 60 percent of retail grocery stores now offer shoppers cards, said Hilary Thesmar, vice president for food safety programs at FMI. The group's members go out of their way to cooperate with public health officials.
“The hardest ones are when they are looking for that food and they have the illnesses and they’re finding it’s hard to detect the source of the illnesses,” Thesmar said. “I know our members receive a lot of requests and they frequently comply with those requests.”
But it’s not always easy, Keene says. Stores provide data only with the permission -- usually written consent -- of the consumer and a verified shopper card or membership number. And disclosure rules vary from state to state, making some information more difficult to obtain.
“We won’t just release data,” said Wilson.
Those concerned about the potential for privacy violations say it’s not nearly tough enough, however. Shopper cards and membership stores that track your groceries are essentially creating a “food registry” of every meal you eat, said Katherine Albrecht, founder and director of CASPIAN, Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering.
She worries that the information one day could be used to control consumers’ health decisions, particularly once federal health care reforms take full effect.
“Once the federal government is paying for your health, it becomes a public health issue what you put in your mouth,” she said, adding later:
“Public health officials want to know exactly what’s on your shelf. Today it’s salmonella, but tomorrow it might be cholesterol, or ice cream.”
In the meantime, though, health officials like Keene say they safeguard the data carefully and use it only as a tool to keep more people from getting sick.
“We are the government, but we aren’t that part of the government,” he said. “We’re the good guys.”
Related stories:
- The surprising foods that make people sick
- New strain of norovirus on the rise
- Who's behind that outbreak? Sometimes CDC won't say
Leave a Comment:
I'm happy with being an insignificant statistic and not one bit worried that Big Brother will be making assumptions about my food choices.
It's not big brother who is collecting the data on your shopping habits, it's the store chains and food industry. You get your membership card at Vons or Stater Bros markets in California. They are interested in what you buy, where off the shelf you purchased it, etc. It tells them what packaging, what type of display, what time of the week, etc. that works with you. All of their stores have essentially the same blueprint. Same with Longs Drugs, Home Depot, and the rest. Marketing has become a science. so the trick is to put two prices on every item. The member and non-member price to entice you to save money and get the card. I'm sorry but I just don't like the concept that I'm a trained monkey and the stores are conditioning me to shop their way. The bottom line, as in all business, is to separate you from your money.
So if General Mills puts out a bad batch of cereal this article is saying it will be easier to trace down all of the people who bought it from their store. True, but all of my information is for sale. After Vons, Stater Bros. and the rest use the data, it goes on the open market to all of the companies whose products you bought. It's there for them if they want it. I'll take my chances with the food poisoning. I'll still sue their ass.
The details make it plain that your shopper card isn't going to "save your life." If you get sick, your shopper card may make it easier to figure out what product is contaminated and pull it so that other people won't get sick, potentially saving the life of some other person who probably doesn't even have a shopper card. That may be a reasonable motive for action (rather like young healthy people getting flu shots so that the old and feeble may benefit), but it doesn't justify rhetoric implying that you personally just might DIE! because you don't have a shopper card.
The flip side is that those records really can be used against you. Right after 9/11 one grocery chain reportedly offered their records to the feds so that they could search them to find other peope who were eating, I suppose they were thinking, suspiciously Mooslim foods. As it happened, ultra-valuable data analysis later determined that terrorists eat a lot of pizza. In the meantime, those of us who buy a lot of lentils and yogurt (or pizza) should be pretty hacked off to think that our grocer might be taking our money hand over fist and then trying to get certain of us in trouble for it. Shopping records have also been used in individual disputes such as divorces and lawsuits. For example, your ex can subpoena your shopping records to argue that you buy a lot of alcohol so aren't fit to have custody. (I buy a lot of beer to subsidize my younger, poorer friends. How could I prove that I hadn't drunk it all myself?)
@ jane-2056095 -- Great posting, your interpretation of the " Shopper card may save your life " article is right on. Make no mistake, this is yet another example of the disappearance / loss of any personal privacy. If I become sick after eating some food item, I am smart enough to interpret that it just might be food poisoning and I myself will inform the doctor of my suspicions. I do not need BIG DADDY GOVERNMENT or anyone else tracking my purchases - just - in case - I may purchase spoiled or contaminated food and, just as mikemather64 posted - I'll take my chances -- and still sue - IF PROVEN - at least for medical expenditures. It's interesting the way that any time BIG DADDY GOVERNMENT or anyone else who wants to invade your privacy by tracking your purchases or tracking you personally always puts it forth or says it's for " YOUR SAFETY ". People -- I'm telling you this is all a bunch of BS. Have you heard ?, that Obama put in the Affordable Care Act -- otherwise known as OBAMACARE that provisions be made to implant all Americans with an RFID chip ( radio frequency ID chip ) -- PHYSICALLY implant this chip in your hand , forehead or somewhere in you, of course stating, this is for your own HEALTH and SAFETY - you know - you could get injured or pass out somewhere / anywhere away from home and the doctors would already - almost instantly -- know what is wrong with you --- I'm thinking - AGAIN - Bulls##t . One must understand that in order for all people on earth to be controlled -- they must be marked and tracked. I'll end by stating that I believe in my savior JESUS CHRIST and what he told me in the bible -- Revelations chapter 13 -- in the end times that the antichrist would cause all people on earth to take his mark , even GOD's elect if possible AND if anyone did not take his mark they would not be able to buy , sell, trade. If you also want to see more about this RFID chipping of Americans all you need to do is get on your computer and go to YOUTUBE and type in RFID. I don't know exactly how soon this will start- BUT - to me, this sure fits what JESUS told me in the book of Revelations about the mark of antichrist AND fall's right in line with being able to track how much money you have and what you are buying. There will be those who simply pass my comments as a crazy person. I would say to those people -- read the book of Revelations in the Bible and ask the Lord for wisdom and you will understand what I am saying is true.
you were doing OK until you ran off the tracks with your fuc king religious BULLS HIT...
Nope. Not "buying" it AT ALL.
Who's this author trying to kid? Ethically challenged retailers and money lovers should hire this author right away. She is obviously so enchanted with the corrupt and unethical ways of the corporate pigs at the trough that she apparently believes tracking people's private information is really for OUR OWN GOOD!
Hey MSNBC, why don't you have the guts to tell your readers what corporate (including MS) is doing to the markets. Are you collectively and institutionally stupid or just a part of the big plan to make money your first, last and only love. Do any of you media darlings give a damn what all these marketing tricks do to humanity, privacy or freedom? CONSUMERISM - RIP!
Several years ago I got a jar of Great Value Peanut Butter at Wal Mart and Wal Mart does not have Rewards Cards. I ate all the peanut butter then threw the jar away. A couple of days later I got sick but I thought it was the flu till my mom called me and told me that their was a peanut butter recall. I still had the receipt for the Great Value Peanut Butter and I found out that Seattle food safety lawyer Bill Marler had a class action law suit against the maker of Great Value Peanut Butter so I contacted them and they said they could not help me because I did not have the Great Value Peanut Butter jar lid. Does anyone really believe that if a food store sells a item and people get sick off of the item and sue the store that they are really going to let you know that you bought the item from them that got you sick.
Ps: All they have to do is match your bank card purchase with the bar code number of the item you bought and they have the same information as the Rewards Card. And even if i had a Rewards Card and no Great Value Peanut Butter lid then tough luck.
your FIRST mistake was buying from Wally World in the first place...
Of course the loyalty cards are for the stores' benefit. But I was pleasantly surprised last year to get a phone call from Giant Eagle here in Ohio, warning me that a bag of spinach I had recently purchased was part of a recall and to bring it in for a refund. Also, I've never paid full price for gas in I don't know how many years at their store-owned gas stations. For every $50 in food purchases with the loyalty card, the customer gets ten cents a gallon off. By the time I have to fill up, I'm getting $1 or more off per gallon. You won't hear me complaining about Big Brother!