Anyone that watches Canadian media have recently been hearing a lot of Listeria and Listeriosis and the knee-jerk reaction against Maple Leaf Foods.

The long story short is as follows: some foods produced by Maple Leaf Foods were contaminated with Listeria, a bacteria that can make you sick. Some people died. More got sick. Maple Leaf recalled a shit-ton of their foods. People stopped buying Maple Leaf products.

I've been reading comments on news articles from people saying that they would stop buying anything Maple Leaf and "let other people be the guinea pigs." My alma matter, University of Waterloo, has stated "Since the initial recall announcement, our chefs have discontinued purchasing any Maple Leaf Foods product and will continue to buy our deli meats from other sources, like Piller and Olymel, going into the Fall term."

Seems like a normal reaction. But the "normal" reaction is just that: a reaction. It's not proactive nor does it protect oneself from future harm. It's emotional and counter-productive. If people think that other food manufacturers are infallible to Listeria(or any other bacteria) contamination, they are living in a dream-world.

Ironically, Maple Leaf Foods has the most incentive to tighten up their production and be as pristine as possible. They're spending millions on the recall and likely millions more cleaning up their plants.

If anything, the safest bet on a source of uncontaminated foods in the coming months and well into the future is from Maple Leaf Foods themselves.