Question

Claim: Burger King, McDonald’s, and KFC food have been proven to contain fecal matter.

Source: Liverpool Echo // https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/scientists-poo-bacteria-fast-food-13351706

Answer 1

According to CNBC UK, significant levels of fecal bacteria were found in the drinks of these major fast-food chains. This result was determined by testing ten samples from each restaurant.  

"Traces of fecal bacteria have been found in drinks at three of the world’s biggest fast-food chains in the United Kingdom." The article is discussing how tests found fecal bacteria in Burger King, Mcdonalds, and KFC drinks.

Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/20/poo-bacteria-found-in-drinks-served-by-mcdonalds-burger-king-and-kfc.html

Answer 2

This is a pretty old article but at the time in 2017, it seems to be true. Liverpool cites a BBC investigation for the findings and multiple platforms have discussed it. But it never states that there's fecal matter in the food, it's in the ice machine. The business insider article I selected discusses other fast-food chains that had some level of contamination and that KFC immediately shut down ice machines. But there's no recent information about their food or ice having any fecal matter in it.

https://www.businessinsider.com/bbc-watchdog-finds-bacterial-faeces-in-drinks-at-mcdonalds-burger-king-and-kfc-2017-7

Answer 3

As stated in the article, it seems that fecal bacteria was found in the ice and other food at these three major fast food chains, at first it seems like an exaggeration, however, after doing some more research, there is a CNBC article that states similar facts as this liverpool article. It states that "Coliforms were found in three samples of McDonald’s drinks, six of Burger King’s and in seven samples taken at KFC sites. Four of the samples taken at Burger King and five at KFC were described as having “significant” levels. Furthermore, after some more digging I was able to find some pdf letters posted by the SEC to McDonald's that states, "In Russia 44 McDonald's branches were found to be in breach of sanitary rules by a government consumer watchdog agency," this fact was also mentioned in the original article. Also these letters state, "In the United States, fecal bacteria were found in ice." Thus, these letters published by the SEC are clearly as legitimate as possible and state very similar things to the Liverpool article, thus I believe this claim is factchecked, but a better word that can be used is bacteria. 

SEC Letters: https://www.sec.gov/divisions/corpfin/cf-noaction/14a-8/2019/johnharrington031219-14a8.pdf

CNBC Article: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/20/poo-bacteria-found-in-drinks-served-by-mcdonalds-burger-king-and-kfc.html#:~:text=Coliforms%20were%20found%20in%20three,as%20having%20%E2%80%9Csignificant%E2%80%9D%20levels.

Answer 4

Only traces of fecal bacteria have been found in the ice at these various places, according to the article from CNBC. Ten samples were taken from each chain to investigate. 

"Coliforms were found in three samples of McDonald’s drinks, six of Burger King’s and in seven samples taken at KFC sites. Four of the samples taken at Burger King and five at KFC were described as having “significant” levels." 

Therefore, the ice in the fast food chains in the UK have some traces of fecal bacteria. 

Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/20/poo-bacteria-found-in-drinks-served-by-mcdonalds-burger-king-and-kfc.html