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Food Law Casebook

Burr v. Coca-Cola Bottling Co. of Columbia, Inc.

1. Causation. Whether brought in a negligence or strict liability action, the plaintiff still must show that their injury was caused by the food product. Causation is not always a trivial endeavor. Absent affirmative evidence or immediate temporal proximity, the causation element may not be satisfied and recovery may be barred. 2. Traceability. In recent years, there has been a strong push towards what is sometimes called "traceability." The basic idea is that it should be possible to trace a food back through the entire chain from production to consumption. The more traceability in the food system, the easier causation will be to satisfy.