Read this Packer story from 2013 for the convoluted hoops public health types are faced with while investigating foodborne illness outbreaks. And now the scientific report: same hoops, same dance, same unsatisfactory outcome for consumers who want to know what’s safe.
A regional, multistate investigation into a June–August 2013 cyclosporiasis outbreak was conducted in Nebraska, Iowa, and neighbouring states. Cases were confirmed on the basis of laboratory and clinical findings.
Of 227 cases in Iowa (n = 140) and Nebraska (n = 87) residents, 162 (71%) reported dining at chain A/B restaurants – 96% reported house salad consumption. A case-control study identified chain A/B house salad as the most likely vehicle. Traceback was conducted to ascertain production lot codes of bagged salad mix (iceberg and romaine lettuce, red cabbage, and carrots) served as house salad in implicated restaurants. A single production lot code of salad mix supplied by both a common producer and distributor was linked to the majority of confirmed cases in persons reporting regional chain A/B exposure.
The salad mix linked to illnesses contained imported romaine lettuce from two separate single-grower fields-of-origin and ≥1 additional field from another grower.
Regional investigation of a cyclosporiasis outbreak linked to imported romaine lettuce – Nebraska and Iowa, June–August 2013
Epidemiology and Infection / Volume 144 / Issue 09 / July 2016, pp 1807-1817Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0950268815002484 (About DOI), Published online: 22 October 2015
F. Buss, M. V. Joshi, A. L. O’keefe, C. D. Allensworth, A. Garvey, K. Obbink, S. Mandernach And T. J. Safranek
