Report details most common causes of foodborne illnesses
The Interagency Food Safety Analytics Collaboration (IFSAC), a joint effort between the USDA, FDA and CDC, has come out with its findings of the causes of foodborne illnesses in 2013. That year, Salmonella illnesses were broadly attributed to a wide variety of foods: E. coli O157 illnesses were most often associated with vegetable row crops (e.g., leafy greens) and beef; Listeria illnesses were most often linked to fruits and dairy products; and non-dairy Campylobacter illnesses were most often attributed to chicken.
IFSAC’s latest study, “Foodborne illness source attribution estimates for 2013 for Salmonella, Escherichia coli O157, Listeria monocytogenes (Lm), and Campylobacter using multi-year outbreak surveillance data, United States,” was compiled with disease data stretching from 1998 through 2013. The latest study was released at the end of December 2017. IFSAC’s study uses data compiled from FDA, USDA and CDC.