(Credits: Netflix)

We live in a world today where people don’t spend much time thinking about food safety. And even if they do, they are too lazy to act upon it. You buy groceries from a big supermarket and complain about the price of eggs, and move on. Sources of the food we’re eating is not an everyday conversation exactly. But the Netflix documentary Poisoned: The Dirty Truth About Your Food makes you realise that maybe we should be talking about it more.

It was released in the year 2023 and directed by Stephanie Soechtig, and aimed to take viewers through the American food industry. But Soechtig did not present it in a lecture kind of way, but rather tried to show a mirror of reality. And the more you hear from the people who actually work in food safety, the harder it becomes to trust the food we are eating and its source.

The director made sure to include testimonies from scientists, food experts and even lawyers so that people don’t feel that it’s just another baseless piece of cinema.

Another major aspect this documentary focuses on is that food poisoning is not a rare problem. Many tend to think it’s an unusual problem, but studies show it is far more common than we realise. Especially in the US, food poisioning happen more often than usual as people get sick after eating contaminated food.

The documentary also takes you through one of the most infamous examples from the year 1993 of the Jack in the Box E. coli outbreak. This was the first time many Americans realised how dangerous contaminated food could be. In fact, it became a topic of national conversation. Children became seriously ill after eating hamburgers that carried dangerous bacteria, and several even died. The tragedy shocked the entire country and forced regulators and the food industry to take food safety more seriously. However, the documentary suggests that even after these changes were made, the system has not undergone many changes.

That’s really the thread running through the documentary. The American food system has grown huge and very efficient over the past few decades. Food travels longer distances, and production happens on a larger scale. The reason behind that is increased shelf life. Sadly, this has made supply chains more complicated than ever. That’s because before you realise, this fast processing and distributing food spreads contamination across multiple states. And many a time it gets too late to come into systems eye. People are constantly failing to re because by then several lives are lost.

Director Soechtig has made sure to make the explanations simple to reach a wider audience. We see that bacteria can travel through contaminated water or poorly sanitised equipment, or even a single infected animal in a massive processing system.

But the major reason why you should watch Poisoned is that it isn’t trying to scare people away from eating anything. Instead, it highlights how complicated the system has become and how difficult it can be to keep every part of it safe. The documentary also makes it clear that many scientists and regulators genuinely want stronger protections in place. They are okay with the food reaching the consumers slower than usual because prevention is better than a cure.

Watching the film doesn’t necessarily make you swear off salads or burgers forever… But it does change the way you think about the journey food takes before it lands on your plate.