I called my daughter today to wish her happy birthday since today is her 35th birthday.  When she came to the phone she couldn’t hardly talk because she has strep-throat and the flu. 

While we were talking she told me that she had gone to the emergency room because her job (she works at Sonic) required that she have a doctors excuse to miss work.  This didn’t surprise me because about 10 years ago when I worked at McDonalds and had the flu they required that I have a doctors excuse.   I thought it was ridiculous because I never missed work.  I was there every day that they had me scheduled and fought them tooth and nail when they would try to start sending me home after only working for a couple of hours. 

What I want you all to think about is this.  A lot of our society eats fast food.  Even when I worked, I ate fast food for lunch just so that I could have a hot meal.  Not all job locations have a kitchen that allows you to heat up food.  I almost always cooked a homemade meal for supper.  It’s the flu and cold season and a lot of flu’s and cold that are passed around just because food establishments require people to either come in to work or bring in a doctors excuse.  Most people who work in food establishments don’t make very much money nor do they have health insurance available to them.  Most of them can’t afford to miss work much less pay for a visit to the doctor. 

We have health regulations that require an employee to report a fever or diarrhea to management.  That employee should be taken away from all food preparation or serving, in fact the employee should be sent home.   That doesn’t happen more times than it does.  Restaurants don’t have anyone looking over their shoulder for these types of violations.  Sure the health department comes in and does inspections, but if there aren’t any violations the health department usually doesn’t show up but twice a year.

So what is the solution?  We could boycott these establishments but the problem is that you aren’t aware that there is some one in the kitchen that is sick and fixing your food because the kitchen staff is always behind closed doors. 

What I have elected to do is based on personal experience.  I know how McDonalds operates therefore I make a conscious decision to not eat at their restaurants every.  I will no longer be eating at Sonic because now that I know from my daughter that they also require sick people to come to work I won’t be spending my money with them.  And during this time of year when the flu is at it’s peek, I’m making a conscious decision to avoid all restaurants.