American authorities are investigating to determine whether the fast food chain Taco Bell is not the cause of a diarrhea epidemic, reports the Futurism website. The disease, caused by the parasite Cyclosporahas now reached 34 states and infected nearly 7,000 people, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The main symptom? Watery and frequent diarrhea which particularly affects Michigan, the epicenter of the epidemic with more than 3,700 cases recorded. This infection, rarely fatal, is transmitted through contaminated water or food, generally during the summer.
Suspicion of Taco Bell emerged after several of the chain’s restaurants in the state of Michigan began removing certain ingredients from their menus. Signs placed in front of establishments indicated that lettuce, cilantro, onion, pico de gallo and guacamole were no longer served, due to a “national recall”without however specifying the exact nature of the latter.
Taco lettuce in the crosshairs
Lettuce is now considered one of the most likely avenues. “The first elements collected indicate lettuce as a product which comes up regularly during the investigation, said Michigan’s chief medical officer, Natasha Bagdasarian. Although we have not yet definitively identified the product causing this outbreak, we wanted to inform Michiganders of what we know so far, so they can take steps to protect their families.”she added.
If the federal authorities have not yet designated any particular vegetable, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has acknowledged continuing its investigation into several vegetables, including lettuce, thus confirming Michigan’s interest in this avenue.
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Some people who became ill, however, claimed not to have eaten at Taco Bell, suggesting that the chain may not be solely responsible for the outbreak. “It’s not like looking for a needle in a haystack. It’s more like looking for a microscopic fragment of a needle in a haystack.summarizes Steven Manderach, director of the International Association Food and Drug Officials. One of the reasons for this difficulty: symptoms only appear one to two weeks after infection, which considerably complicates the traceability work.
Testing for the presence of the parasite in food is also much more complex than with other pathogens, says Steven Manderach. The process requires washing large quantities of the potentially contaminated food to extract the organisms from it. Cyclosporareduce the rinse water obtained, then analyze it to detect the possible presence of the parasite. “It would take whole truckloads of lettuce to hope to achieve this”illustrates Steven Manderach, who had already managed cyclosporosis epidemics in the past. This task is particularly difficult for local services in small towns.
Several public health specialists believe that identifying the origin of this epidemic is also complicated by budget cuts affecting certain agencies and programs of the US Department of Health (HHS). Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has indeed made several budget and staff reductions, as part of cost reduction efforts led by billionaire Elon Musk at the head of his “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE).
Result: federal authorities have reduced the capacity of their foodborne illness surveillance network (FoodNet), responsible for tracking several pathogens, including Cyclosporasalmonella and listeria. Last year, this network had already reduced its surveillance to just two pathogens.
