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Online Epidemiology: RUSICK2
surfinbox writes "Forbes magazine print edition mentions Michigan State University's online epidemiology site called RUSICK2. If you get sick from a probable food bourne bug, log in to RUSICK2 and report where you ate and when. When they start to see a pattern, they can take action to prevent further illness. I love the RUSICK2 logo!"
I think they want to know about everything you ate that day, not just the components still recognizable in your vomit.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Duh. How about just examining your vomitus and/or feces? That should jog your memory. I mean, if you aren't puking or drizzling, you wouldn't be reporting to this site, right?
Because sometimes what made you sick isn't what you are puking up or droping out. Some pathogens take over 48 hours to incubate into an illenss by then the food that you ate is long gone.
I used to work for Communicable Disease Control for the state of Missouri. They had problems with a lot of people reporting resturants as the source of their illness since it was the last place they ate. So they blamed the Wendy's they ate at on the way home from a day at the lake where they had grilled chicken and infected themselves.
As x approaches total apathy I couldn't care less.
Entering incorrect or humorous data is very easy. For example, you will find that the system readily accepts reports of getting sick eating "Goc" at the new Klingon restaurant in town, or most anything else that you can imagine. However, this particular web site is trying to help prevent the 5,000 to 8,000 deaths that occur each year due to foodborne disease. Please respect the important mission of the Forum by insuring that your submissions are accurate and well based on fact. It is also important to remember that all site visitors are on notice that submitted data will be shared with U.S., local, and state health departments; Forum users who submit false information may therefore be subject to civil or criminal liability for such acts.
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dman123 forever!
Filtering out the -1s and 0s since 1999.
Last spring I had the unfortunate experience of getting horrifically ill from a local resteraunt here in East Lansing. I had just read about RUSICK2, so I signed up and headed off to use the site. Sure enough, when I searched for others who might have been ill during the same time as me I found three others who ate at the same place.
Unfortunately, the site was quite laborious and no one is really going to take the time to fill out *all* the information that they ask for. Here in East Lansing, MI almost no one has ever heard of RUSICK2. If no one knows about the site, the sampling size will never be large enough to be useful. To be fair though, it is a great idea and definitely steps in the right direction.
And on a side note...avoid the kimchee cheegae. Ugh.
Sometimes that's not too helpful. For some people, it's a 4x4 grid of possibilities, and all the rest is just indistinguishable brown goo.
Purple Koolaid Not Purple Koolaid
-------------- ----------
Corn |
NOT Corn |
Yep, that's just about it.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
Now when I go to a strange town, I don't need to use Zagat's to find a good restaurant anymore. I just need to search RUSICK2. No hits = good eats (or at least nontoxic eats). OK, I guess I still need Zagat's, but RUSICK is a good cross-reference.
The service does have many sources of error. Illness does not always immediately follow consumption (I've seen reports that bad seafood can cause symptoms 2-3 days after eating). Thus, I would suspect that some reports will erroneously correlate sickness with the most recent meal.
I also wonder if this service will survive litigation. I can imagine some arrogant chef hiring a laywer to go after RUSICK2 for libel.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.