Foodborne Illnesses Are Up Across US: Which To Look Out For
Twelve foodborne illness outbreak investigations have been launched by the FDA in the past two months alone.
In 2026, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has already conducted 21 investigations into foodborne illness outbreaks across the United States, marking an unusually active period. This surpasses the 26 investigations conducted in all of 2025, and the 21 investigations in the same period of previous years. The FDA's heightened activity suggests consumers may face a greater risk from contaminated food this year compared to recent years.
Salmonella, E. coli, Listeria, and Cyclospora are the primary pathogens behind these outbreaks. In the past six years, these four pathogens accounted for 91 percent of the FDA's total foodborne illness investigations. Cyclospora, in particular, has seen a significant rise in 2026, with 13,895 laboratory-confirmed cases reported so far. This is nearly ten times the number reported between May and August of the previous year, 2025. Two deaths and 740 hospitalizations have been reported in 2026 alone.
One outbreak has been traced back to iceberg lettuce imported from Mexico. Cyclospora has also been linked to seven separate FDA investigations in 2026, the highest annual number since 2020. Simultaneously, the CDC and state health officials are investigating a multistate Salmonella outbreak linked to jalapeño peppers, which has caused 345 confirmed illnesses and 36 hospitalizations in 27 states.
Written by urgent.news from Newsweek's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
