In December 2019, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, announced that it had updated its food surveillance data page, with a “FoodNet Fast,” a feature that provides information from to the Foodborne Diseases Act Surveillance Network (FoodNet), an online tool for visualizing the CDC’s national food borne illness tracking efforts. Through FoodNet Fast, Americans can visualize rates of food borne illness since 1996 for nine common pathogens, including listeria, salmonella and Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC). Users can also learn how diagnostic testing practices have changed over time, as well as track instances of Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome, a life threatening condition that can be triggered by STEC. FoodNet Fast data represent about 15% of the U.S. population.
To get a sense of food borne illness outbreaks across the country, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention compiles a web-based food-borne outbreak online database tool – Food Tool. The outbreak data reported to the CDC begins in 1998 and was last updated in October 2017, with information from outbreaks in 2016.
The CDC also compiles an annual summary of food-borne outbreaks here. The data provide a picture of which foods are associated with the most illnesses.
The agency also operates a Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network, or FoodNet, which tracks trends in common foodborne illness infections. Data gathered by the network is summarized in an annual report to provide information to food policy and safety experts. Preliminary data used in the reports is usually reported annually in the spring.
The Food and Drug Administration created a Coordinated Outbreak Response and Evaluation Network to manage the federal government’s response to a food-related illness outbreak. See information here.
If you want the most up-to-date information about foods that have been recalled, take a look at the FDA’s recalls, market withdrawals and safety alerts related to food products here. Reporters can sign up for email alerts. More resources on FDA food alerts can be found here.
The government also maintains a federal food safety website, with contributions from the FDA, CDC and U.S. Department of Agriculture, on food illness alerts and consumer food safety information here.
Are you looking for more information about the latest foodborne illness outbreak? Check out Outbreakdatabase.com. It was created by the law firm partnered by Bill Marler, a plaintiffs’ attorney who has been suing food producers on behalf of consumers sickened by a food poisoning for decades. He is best known for representing Brianne Kiner, a 9-year-old girl most seriously injured by the Jack in the Box E. coli O157:H7 outbreak in 1983. This database provides summaries of significant food and water outbreaks that have occurred since 1984. A basic search of the data can be found by putting in a pathogen, food or beverage and year.