“I’ll take a chicken burrito with lettuce, rice, and extra guac. But hold the e coli.”- These are words of nearly every mainstream teenager on the planet right now. Popular for its jampacked burritos and guacamole, Chipotle has become a huge sensation in the food industry. With it being so famous, its recent outbreak in E. Coli has brought fear to burrito-loving customers. This threat leaves customers asking themselves “Is it worth the risk?”

“I LOVE IT!” exclaimed CFHS student Kayla Roeber when asked about her thoughts on the popular Mexican grill. Giving it an 8.5 out of 10, she claims that her usual chicken burrito occasionally contains burnt chicken. Another Chipotle customer, Mason Lundell, says his chicken or pork burrito “Is nothing special,” so he gives it a 7 out of 10. Finally, Matt Sjoblom says that Chipotle is pretty good and reasonably priced for how big the burrito is. Although, like Kayla, he says the chicken does get burnt occasionally, so he gives the grill a 7.5 out of 10. Even though these are pretty good reviews, is it worth the chance of getting E. Coli?

Chipotle has been all over the news about the outbreak of bacteria in their restaurant. This nasty pathogen is classified as E. coli. Although it is not just any E. coli, it is STEC 026 which comes from the guts of animals like goats, deer and cows. When getting the awful bacteria, customers display symptoms which include, diarrhea, severe stomach pains, vomiting, and sometimes a fever. Sadly, the only thing to do to cure it is stay hydrated. STEC 026 was found in Chipotle’s Australian beef that Chipotle started importing a few years ago. Australian cows are grass fed, a must for the company. The increased demand for these animals could be linked to the butchering of sick and unhealthy cows.

The recent bacteria outbreak from the Mexican grill has been in 11 states and hospitalizing 21 out of the 50 infected. The biggest state outbreaks have been in  Washington, Oregon, California, Minnesota, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. From this major news, sales plummeted 14% in December and 36% in January. Although don’t give up on cheap burritos yet.

The chances of catching  E. coli from the restaurant are significantly less than 1%. Taking many thorough precautions, Chipotle is taking matters into their own hands. Some specific steps include marinating veggies in citrus juice, preparing veggies in a central testing kitchen, boiling onions, avocados and jalapenos before making their delicious guacamole, marinating chicken and steak away from other ingredients in plastic bags and finally, adding tasty cilantro in rice to kill germs. To educate their staff on these helpful changes, the grill closed for a few hours on February 8th, 2016 to have a National staff meeting.

With all the hype and controversy over Chipotle’s food, we can honestly say it is worth the risk. The spicy Mexican grill has done everything in its power to fix all the problems that could’ve gone wrong with their food. Their chicken burritos and tasty fillers have clearly lived up to their word. American’s everywhere have craved Chipotle over the past years and after all the good reviews we can assume the love isn’t going to die down anytime soon. After ordering, the worker responded to the hungry teen “You’re in luck. We actually don’t serve E. Coli here anymore.”