This time, it's not the food, but the soda fountains to be worried about. According to Tom Laskawy, a media and technology professional and blogger for grist.org, a team of microbiologists from Hollins University found that 48% of sodas tested from the fast food fountains contain coliform bacteria, which is typically fecal in origin. And most bacteria found were antibiotic resistant, as icing on the cake.

The microbiologists published their findings in the International Journal of Food Microbiology. They tested 90 beverages from 30 soda fountains. Their abstract states:

...Coliform bacteria was detected in 48% of the beverages and 20% had a heterotrophic plate count greater than 500 cfu/ml. [...] More than 11% of the beverages analyzed contained Escherichia coli [E. Coli] and over 17% contained Chryseobacterium meningosepticum. Other opportunistic pathogenic microorganisms isolated from the beverages included species of Klebsiella, Staphylococcus, Stenotrophomonas, Candida, and Serratia. Most of the identified bacteria showed resistance to one or more of the 11 antibiotics tested.

Laskawy notes that only one recorded outbreak linked to a soda fountain has occurred, and that was ten years ago. But on a smaller scale, these bacteria could cause sickness on an individual level that can go unreported.

By Sharmeen Gangat

Women from a country in the news for its dysfunction and poverty are reaching out to grasp economic opportunities in their new U.S. home, even as they stay true to traditional roots.

January 6, 2010

In Brooklyn, New York, a group of Yemeni women have become microentrepreneurs so that, among other goals, they can buy Metrocards for travel to a center where they learn English. Coming from the poorest country of the Arabian Peninsula, one that has ranked lowest for the last four years on the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report, they refuse to let the current distressed economic climate in this country confine them to their homes.

These immigrant women—most of whom have been in the United States for less than two years—prepare greeting cards that they sell with the support of the organization that houses their project: the Arab American Family Support Center. As they work to improve their communications skills and gain economic independence, they defy Western notions that veiled women are conservative and insular. Such were the initial assumptions, for example, of a staff writer for the Observer, who was “dismayed” that her English-speaking translator for a story on Yemen women was fully veiled—though she realized as she got to know her that the issue of a veil was a “red herring.”

 

CAVUTO: Retired Army Sergeant First Class and tea party activist Steve McQueen saying, “Not so fast Mr. Steele.” He joins me right now. Steve, you would say “not quite,” right?

MCQUEEN: Not quite, Neil. Actually the Tea Party is, I liken that to an army of Davids which I am only one. I do confer with Tea Party organizations all over the country so I feel confident that I understand what the movement’s about and as I understand it right now, the GOP is currently on probation with the American people and obviously you can’t be on probation and probably be a member of the Tea Parties at the same time.