Wouldn't it be closer to millions?

Unless coffee is too acidic this is one instance where mentioning botulism might actually be justified

I ran a microbiology lab that specifically tested for food borne illness causing bacteria.

Here's a very recent attempt to assess the safety of cold brew coffee coming out of UGA. https://newswire.caes.uga.edu/story/10365/cold-brew-coffee.html

These findings line up with earlier work such as this paper doing a general analysis of cold brew coffee and this Canadian government report on detected food borne pathogens in cold brew coffee..

The consensus I'm seeing is that cold brew coffee, especially when kept cold, is not a great environment for most food borne illness causing pathogens to thrive. Bacillus cereus and potentially botulism would have been more accurate choices.

Listeria survives well in a cold, wet environment so I would say it was spot on.

Thank god , I was worried there was something I’d missed on cold brew coffee and I should be bleaching more things between runs

The thing I remember listeria getting into for my food manager safety cert was underheated nacho cheese and deli meats!

I am confused. You are not the OP?

* OHH THE OG OOP.

Well I have had it 3 times (Caramel apples, Hummus, Ice Cream)

And I think I made that face each time sooo.. Yeah I think it works.

idk man, the shit that comes out of the drip tray of my coffee machine sure smells like it has a lot of bacteria in it

I think the concern initially was that cold brew may be more prone to bacterial contamination than normal coffee, because it has lower acidity and the water used to make it is not boiled. But like the study you linked found, it seems to be safe at least when refrigerated.

Doing longer extractions (12hr+) with room temperature water makes very smooth coffee with much less bitterness and significantly higher caffeine content. It's also less fussy - set it up in the evening and have great coffee in the morning.