Ham is available in several forms. Some already are cooked and ready for you to eat the minute you buy them. Ham also is usually cured, which adds another layer of confusion because not all cured hams are cooked. What seems like a versatile protein source for your diet is actually quite a minefield when it comes to food poisoning. If you confuse cooking hams with precooked hams, you risk ingesting contaminants that can make you sick. Clear labeling laws have reduced the confusion.
Pathogens
Ham has three major contaminants that affect it. One is mold, especially on “country-cured” hams; the Department of Agriculture notes that you can wash the moldy parts off and save the rest of the ham; use hot water, clean the entire ham and take a stiff brush to the patches of mold. Staphyloccoccus, or staph, can transfer from humans to the ham during handling, and trichinae, which are organisms that can cause trichinosis, come from infected pigs. Colorado State University Extension notes that staph infections have symptoms such as cramping and nausea, but that you’re not likely to die from them. The University of Florida notes that some trichinosis infections don’t produce symptoms if few of the organisms are eaten, but in severe cases they can be similar to a severe flu.
Pathways
Ham can become contaminated at any point in the production process, and trichinae can exist in the pig itself. If cooked ham picks up more germs, they can grow as the ham cools down, if it doesn’t become too cold for the germs to survive. Poor human hygiene is another problem; the ham might be properly cured and packaged, but if the person handling it hasn’t washed his hands, he could transmit staph bacteria.
Cooking
In the United States, a ham that you have to cook is required to have a label that not only tells you that you have to cook it but also what the cooking instructions are. Do not rely on the curing status of the ham to determine whether to cook it. Curing has different subtypes, from fresh-cured or cured-raw to cured-cooked. Different methods such as wet and dry curing also figure into the ham’s status, but again, words such as dry and wet are not enough to determine if you can eat the ham without further cooking.
Cautions
If you’re not sure if a ham is safe to eat, don’t eat it. Frugality does not mean you have to risk food poisoning. Contact your doctor if you notice any nausea, fever or other signs of illness within a couple of days of eating ham. Remember that if you are overseas, the country you are in may have different hygienic standards regarding meat. Check with your doctor, a travel agency and the tourist information office local to where you are traveling to see if there are safety restrictions regarding eating meat in the country you are visiting.
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