Foodborne illness: Is it increasing or decreasing in the U.S? Why?

Recently, Time magazine devoted considerable space to explaining this seemingly contradictory headline : "Why the rise in food poisoning reports is actually a good thing."  Does Time approve of an increase in foodborne illness?  Not at all.  Here's the point:  Foodborne illness is in the news more "because of the speed with which outbreaks are identified--and the public notified." 

But this raises another question: what's increased the speed?  The Time article focuses upon two factors.  Shelf Life Advice has learned about additional ones. Let's investigate further.

Time gives the credit to 1) quicker, more accurate tracking of the pathogens that cause food-borne illness and 2) more severe penalties against executives whose behavior has caused food poisoning outbreaks.  The magazine predicts that, as a result of these factors, "food will only get safer" and "we will all be healthier."

Next question: what has enabled us to find the exact source of these outbreaks?  The answer is this: a tracking system called PulseNet, which can take advantage of whole-genome sequencing to find "more accurate DNA fingerprints of microbes."  PulseNet makes it faster and easier to loocate cases of food-borne illnesses that came from the same food source.  This makes it possible to get contaminated food off the market sooner and vastly decreases the number of patients affected. Here are two examples  that Time gives:  In 1993, during an E.coli outbreak, more than 700 people were sickened, and four died.  In a similar outbreak after PulseNet was in use, just 44 people became ill, and there were no deaths.  In 2015, whole-genome sequencing was used by the CDC to find the source of the well-publicized Blue Bell ice cream listeria outbreak, which killed 3 people.  The company took its entire product line off the market and is now being investigated by  the Department of Justice.

Food scientist Dr. Catherine Cutter (a member of the Shelf Life Advice advisory board) says that the implications of  PulseNet are "huge."  But, in addition to the benefits of this technology, she says, "awareness is increasing" because medical workers are being fed more information about food-borne illness, which affects 1 in 6 Americans annually. 

Dr. Cutter credits the STOP Foodborne Illness initiative with  helping to educate emergency room physicians so that they consider a diagnosis of foodborne illness when a patient has stomach problems rather than assuming it's stomach flu. See http://shelflifeadvice.com/content/sudden-awful-intestinal-distress-it-flu-or-foodborne-illness-or-both for a discussion of this confusion. 

STOP Foodborne Illness is a national nonprofit public health organization.  Its mission is to prevent sickness and death due to foodborne pathogens.  To this end, it has, as one of its major goals, increasing awareness about foodborne illness among emergency room personnel.  The hope is that more victims of foodborne illness will benefit from more rapid diagnosis and treatment of their problem. 

The CDC, quoted in the STOP Foodborne Illness article, indicates how complicated the spread of foodborne illness has become: "Changes in human demographics and food preferences, changes in food production and distribution systems, microbial adaptation, and lack of support for public health resources and infrastructure have led to the emergence of novel as well as traditional foodborne diseases. With increasing travel and trade opportunities, it is not surprising that now there is a greater risk of contracting and spreading a foodborne illness locally, regionally, and even globally....Physicians and other health care professionals have a critical role in the prevention and control of food-related disease outbreaks."

Dr. Timothy Bowser, another member of the Shelf Life Advice Advisory Board, offered this comment: "To me, PulseNet is more about communications and data sharing than anything else. The new technologies used in outbreak tracking are developed independently of PulseNet. I believe that PulseNet has helped to identify outbreaks earlier than ever before, but finding the source still takes time. Reducing time helps to lessen the impact of a foodborne illness and could save lives and businesses. PulseNet functions on a national and international basis. The international function could have a great impact on disease prevention worldwide."

Food scientist Dr. Joe Regenstein, yet another member of our Advisory Board, agrees that our food supply is getting safer and  also considers PulseNet a significant  component of this improvement.  But he adds another element: the fact that Americans are eating more fresh and under-processed food. He considers this trend "good in principle even though sometimes the canned and processed products are actually better and safer."  

BUT don't be too quick to conclude that eating in the U.S. is safe after all.  In fact, the FDA was recently scolded by the inspector general's office at the Department of Health and Human Service for not acting promptly enough and "allowing some food safety investigations to drag on, placing consumers in jeopardy of death or serious illness."  One example given: a case involving peanut butter and almond products. The recall did not occur until 165 days after the FDA first found salmonella in samples.  Results of an ongoing review of 30 recalls from 2012-2015 will be announced in the future.  However, says the Chicago Tribune,  the FDA has a tough job--overseeing "about 80% of the nation's food supply, including seafood, dairy, fruits and vegetables."  Precise DNA mapping  is a great tool but for our food supply, but there's still room for further improvement.  Contaminated food or beverages still cause about 48 million Americans a year to become sick; about 128,000 of these victims wind up in the hospital and some 3,000 die. The numbers should decline in the future if technology, communication, and education do their jobs effectively.

For additional information and/or to make a donation to STOP Foodborne Illness, visit www.stopfoodborneillness.org or call 773-269-6555.

Source(s):

Time, "The View" column, , "Why the rise in food-poisoning reports is actually a good thing," by Alexandra Sifferlin, March 28, 2016.

Timothy J. Bowser, Ph.D. , Oklahoma State University, Dept. of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering

Catherine Nettles Cutter, Ph.D. , Pennsylvania State University, Department of Food Science

Joe Regenstein, Ph.D., Cornell University, Department of Food Science

24-7pressrelease.com  "STOP Foodborne Illness Launches Initiative to Cultivate Greater Awareness Among Emergency Room Personnel about Foodborne Illness" 

http://www.24-7pressrelease.com/press-release/stop-foodborne-illness-launches-initiative-to-cultivate-greater-awareness-among-emergency-room-personnel-about-foodborne-illness-421539.php 

ShelfLifeAdvice.com  "Sudden, Awful Intestinal Distress--Is it the flu or a foodborne illness--or both?"  

http://shelflifeadvice.com/content/sudden-awful-intestinal-distress-it-flu-or-foodborne-illness-or-both 

Chicago Tribune, Business Section