Fact: Food poisoning is relatively rare. It's food-borne illness you must be careful of. Food poisoning occurs when toxic substances such as pesticide residues are consumed with food. Symptoms of food poisoning usually appear quickly after eating or drinking. Food-borne illness occurs when harmful microorganisms such as bacteria are consumed with food.

Myth: You can tell which restaurant made you sick because the symptoms occur the next day.

Fact: The symptoms of food-borne illnesses are most likely to strike from two hours to two days after eating but some toxins in fish work within minutes, while botulism can take a week to make itself known. Hepatitis A, common virus-related illness may take from a week to 20 days to incubate.

Fact: Yes, if you also avoid cross-contamination. If cooked food comes in contact with an unwashed utensil, dish, countertop, or hand that was used to prepare tainted uncooked food, food-borne illness can result.

 Fact: Some effects of food-borne illness can be permanent. Salmonella can cause rheumatoid arthritis. E coil Ol 57:H7 can cause kidney disease. Campylobacter or ciguatera (the most common poisoning from finish) can cause nerve damage.

Fact: People who regularly take antacids are more likely to get food-borne illnesses than people who don't take them. This is because stomach acids kill bacteria.

Answer: To some extent, it varies depending on the size and physical condition of the person in question but in general, it doesn't take many Salmonella bacteria to make you ill. In 1994, ice cream distributed in 41 states made 224,000 people sick. It contained about six Salmonella bacteria per serving.

Myth: A wooden cutting-board is safer because bacteria are absorbed into wood fibers and remain beneath the surface, away from food.

Fact: The most important factor about cutting boards is cleanliness. Wood is harder to clean than plastic. The best advice is to: 1) keep a separate cutting board for meat and poultry, 2) keep boards clean by putting them in the dishwasher or scrubbing them with a mild bleach solution. Dispose of boards that have deep knife scars

Fact: Marinating ceviche in an acid doesn't kill all the harmful bacteria or parasites that the fish could contain. Neither does cutting up raw fish for sushi.

Myth: Special produce washes remove pesticides.

Fact: Half of fruits and vegetables tested by the FDA contain pesticide residues. Worse, most of that 50 percent contains residues of more than one pesticide. Special fruit-and-vegetable washes do not work any better than washing produce with a mild dishwashing detergent. Such washing combined with peeling carrots and removing the skins of fruits and the outer leaves of lettuce and cabbage is your best way to remove chemical residues. 

Myth: Once the date on a milk carton has been reached, the milk shouldn't be consumed.

Fact: Milk carton dates are primarily for the benefit of storekeepers and route salespersons. It tells them when to remove the product from shelves. Assuming it has been kept at the right temperature, milk that has reached its expiration is still safe to consume, nutritious and probably won't go sour for another week.