You gotta love this: "Reusable grocery bags may cause food poisoning"

You've seen them at Whole Foods and Trader Joe's. They are the keepers of the environment; the conscientious ones among us who really think their reusable "earth friendly" shopping bags are making an impact in the effort to stop global warming (or cooling or climate change of any kind).

Now, it may be postulated that reusable grocery bags cause food poisoning. That's right; if they are not washed and disinfected after each use, deadly bacteria could be left behind. But won't that require more water and more energy to be used? Yup!

"The main risk is food poisoning," Dr. Richard Summerbell, research director at Toronto-based Sporometrics and former chief of medical mycology for the Ontario Ministry of Health, stated in a news release. Dr. Summerbell evaluated the study results.

"But other significant risks include skin infections such as bacterial boils, allergic reactions, triggering of asthma attacks, and ear infections," he stated.

The study found that 64% of the reusable bags tested were contaminated with some level of bacteria and close to 30% had elevated bacterial counts higher than what's considered safe for drinking water.

Further, 40% of the bags had yeast or mold, and some of the bags had an unacceptable presence of coliforms, faecal intestinal bacteria, when there should have been 0.

"The presence of faecal material in some of the reusable bags is particularly concerning," Dr. Summerbell stated. "All meat products should be individually wrapped before being placed in a reusable bag to prevent against leakage. This should become a mandated safety standard across the entire grocery industry."

Don't use your cloth grocery bags for toting gym clothes or diapers or anything but your groceries to prevent possible exposure to a superbug called community-acquired MRSA, a highly antibiotic-resistant form of a common infectious bacterium, Dr. Summerbell cautioned.

The study was funded by the Environment and Plastics Industry Council (EPIC), an industry initiative to promote responsible use and recovery of plastic resources. EPIC is a committee of the Canadian Plastics Industry Association.

Check out the story. It's another case of stereotypical unintended circumstances when people make feel-good, emotional decisions based on what those in the "green movement" tell them they need to do to save "mother earth".

Now what will these folks do? They may have to wait for a United Nations decision on the matter before going shopping again.