Say I go to a restaurant and find a hair in my food. Are there any actual health risks?
Does it make a difference if I:
- Find it in the dish, remove it, and keep eating
- Take a bite, find it in my mouth, and remove it
- Ingest it
This was inspired by a recent news story about a certain authoritarian butthole cosplaying as a food service worker. I did try to look it up (er, search it up?), but the top hits were lengthy meandering articles, or totally off-topic stuff like foods to prevent hair loss. So naturally I gave up and opted to consult the hive mind instead.
From a technical perspective, yes, there could be health risks from hair in your food. There may be chemicals in the hair from various hair products or there could be bacterial contamination, though that’s a low risk unless you’re consuming a lot of hair that hadn’t been cooked.
In reality, it’s unlikely a few hairs are going to cause any sort of issue other than texture/mouth feel.
That being said, Trump’s hair could be made from asbestos for all we know. That shit doesn’t look natural at all.
Fungal infections as well!
But yes, there is a risk, even if it’s not as bad as unwashed hands or using contaminated equipment (knife on raw chicken to veggies, etc,) or generally unsafe food handling (thawing peas and just letting them sit.)
That’d be more of an issue if you’re rubbing that hair onto your skin.