The Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday that the U.S. food supply remains “one of the safest in the world,” in the wake of a number of foodborne illness outbreaks affecting things ranging from organic carrots Unpleasant cold cuts Unpleasant McDonald’s Quarter pounders. E.coli, listeria and other contaminants have sickened thousands of people in recent months and forced a number of recalls.
But despite these high-profile examples, the data cited by the FDA suggests that the number of recalls was not unusually high over the past year.
For the fiscal year that ended in September, there were 179 recalls that were considered by the agency’s Food and Cosmetic Division to be for the highest risk classification, such as possible contamination with bacteria or undeclared allergens.
That’s up from the 145 high-risk recalls in 2023, but down from the 185 the agency recorded in 2022. There were 167 high-risk recalls in 2019.
This classification includes the recall of tens of thousands of cases of onions processed by Taylor Farms that were recalled earlier this fall after officials suspected they were responsible for a deadly attack. E. coli outbreak linked to McDonald’s Quarter Pounder burgers becoming ill over a hundred people.
‘Our ultimate goal is for the industry to do its part to ensure that the foods they bring to market are not forged or misbranded. Recalls help get food off the market quickly if something goes wrong. Outbreak advisories provide the public with important food safety information,” an FDA spokesperson said in a statement.
The spokesperson also pointed to The Economist’s report that measures global food security. The U.S. food supply is “among the safest in the world” and ranks “joint first for food safety indicator in 2022,” the spokesperson said.
In fact, the FDA suggested, the number of recalls is an indicator that the safety system is working.
“Preventing recalls and outbreaks means manufacturers, importers and distributors are watching for problems and taking action when they discover a problem,” the FDA spokesperson said.
An increase in illnesses in CDC data – but also an increase in testing
Figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that the number of high-profile recalls has increased from last year, but not by much.
So far this year, ten “multistate foodborne outbreaks” have been issued by the CDC. Last year there were nine reports. There were 24 notifications in 2018, the most of any year in the past decade.
The number of infections from foodborne outbreaks, such as Shiga toxin-producing E. coli, or STEC, has risen to at least 13,962 this year, the CDC data shows.
This time last year there were approximately 13,140 cases reported by health departments and in 2019 there were 12,119 cases reported by this time.
Foodborne diseases Linked to other pathogens have also increased across the country in recent years, according to reports from the CDC’s FoodNet system, although improvements in how patients are tested for these germs may help explain some of the increase.
“Laboratory technology is changing and that’s impacting what we see in the surveillance data. As lab tests get faster, they become more specific and they get better in other ways. It makes the data a little less comparable,” said Sharon Shea, senior director of food safety at the Association for Public Health Laboratories, told CBS News.
Shea, who has also worked as a microbiologist in hospital and public health labs, said other ways public health departments and doctors respond to foodborne outbreaks have also improved.
Part of that is a time-saving shift to ‘molecular-based’ panel tests that can be run by hospitals and clinical labs for a range of pathogens, rather than one-off tests for specific pathogens, which were rolled out after 2012.
Labs in the PulseNet network, supported by the CDC, have also turned to “whole genome sequencing,” Shea said — a more accurate approach to narrowing down the unique genetic fingerprint that can connect different cases for researchers. These compounds could be critical in uncovering common foods eaten by sick people during an outbreak.
“The Most Avoidable, Unnecessary Deaths”
Food safety advocates outside the government say there is still a lot of room to improve food safety in the US.
“It doesn’t help to say ‘Americans have the safest food in the world’ when it kills people.” baby carrots” said Sarah Sorscher, head of regulatory affairs at the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
Sorscher acknowledged that public health departments have gotten better at investigating outbreaks, but cautioned that still only a fraction of foodborne illnesses have been resolved.
“Our public health system is getting better at dealing with outbreaks thanks to advances in whole genome sequencing and artificial intelligence, so we may just be seeing more of the iceberg now than we were a few years ago,” said them.
Staff shortages and food safety failures had also led to an artificial drop in the number of recalls and reported illnesses during the COVID-19 pandemic, Sorscher said.
“Our food supply is not as safe as it was five years ago. Anyone who has gone to the grocery store or searched the refrigerator to see which onions and carrots in the vegetable drawer are the subject of the latest recall knows that,” he said. Scott Faber, senior vice president for government relations at the nonprofit Environmental Working Group.
Faber pointed to a previous report that tracked a recovery in food recalls after 2020, based on data from the FDA and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
FDA inspections of food facilities fall short of Congress’ mandate, the Environmental Working Group has argued. They have also criticized the agency for not requiring testing of irrigation water sprayed on crops, which could pose a risk of contamination from nearby animal feed operations.
“Just like washing your hands or not cutting your vegetables on the same cutting board as your chicken, they’re just common sense measures to reduce the risk of foodborne illness. And these are the most preventable, unnecessary deaths you’ll experience. you can imagine,” says Faber.
