Food: Science Picture Challenge #2 entry one: Raw fish meat should you be eating it?

Again, I must stress that I am glad that @mcw and @steemstem are keeping the #sciencepic challenge going for the easy baby step for everyone to embrace their daily life science~

Here is my 1st photo entry for the challenge:

The photo shows a common Japanese delicacy
Sushi and sashimi are a big dilemma for microbiologist, consuming raw seafood meat always pose potential risk for their consumers. Microbes can easily grow on uncooked food, and sushi or sashimi are considered as ready to eat food in general. To determine whether those food are safe for human consumption, a microbiological count method was established for the evaluation of the amount of microbes.
Three components of the microbe population counts,

1: Aerobic colony count, also known as total viable count meaning the aerobic environmental microbes on the food are estimated. Spoilage is likely to occur if the number is over 10^7 CFU per gram of food.

2: Hygiene indicator organisms, are those microbes that reflects the hygienic quality of food. Escherichia coli which is a common fecal indicator organism are frequently used. If the E. coli CFU/g is high, your food is probably not prepared in a very hygienic manner.

3: Specific foodborne pathogens, refers to microbes that are considered as food borne pathogens which could lead to food poisoning. The tolerance to their presence are usually minimal as successful infection will lead to pathogenicity.

Studies have shown that food borne pathogens could be found in significant number of sushi samples, it tastes good, but is it worth the risk?

這張照片顯示了一個普通的日本美食
壽司和生魚片對於微生物學家來說是一個巨大的困境，生吃海鮮肉類對消費者來說總是有潛在的風險。微生物可以很容易地生長在未經烹煮的食物上，壽司或生魚片一般被認為是可直接食用的食物。為了確定這些食物是否安全供人食用，建立微生物計數法來評估微生物的數量。
微生物數量的三個組成部分，

1：需氧菌落計數，也稱總活菌數，意指食物上的有氧環境微生物。如果每克食物的數量超過10 ^ 7 CFU，則可能發生腐敗。

2：衛生指標有機體，是反映食品衛生質量的微生物。經常使用作為常見的糞便指示生物體的大腸桿菌（Escherichia coli）。如果大腸桿菌CFU / g很高，那麼您的食物可能是以非常不衛生的方式製作的。

3：特定的食源性致病菌，是指被認為是食源性致病菌的微生物，可能導致食物中毒。對其存在的耐受性通常是最小的，因為成功的感染會導致致病性。

研究表明，食品中的病原體可以在大量的壽司樣本中找到，它的味道很好，但是值得冒這個風險嗎？

Reference
http://www.cfs.gov.hk/english/food_leg/files/food_leg_Microbiological_Guidelines_for_Food_e.pdf
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/5383628_Microbiological_Quality_of_Sushi_from_Sushi_Bars_and_Retailers
http://www.fehd.gov.hk/safefood/ready-to-eat-food.pdf

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