Mexico and the US FDA offer conflicting accounts of last summer’s cyclospora outbreak
The FDA confirmed that the source of the contamination was a Guanajuato farm, but offered no final determination on how the lettuce became contaminated. Mexico's Cofepris disputes even the naming of the farm as the source, calling it inconclusively proven. The post Mexico and the US FDA offer conflicting accounts of last summer’s cyclospora outbreak appeared first on Mexico News Daily
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) concluded its investigation into the cyclospora outbreak last summer, attributing the source to a farm in Guanajuato supplying iceberg lettuce to a U.S. distributor. Despite this, the FDA did not confirm how the contamination occurred. Meanwhile, Mexico's government refuted the FDA's findings, stating that U.S. investigations had not conclusively proven that Mexican products caused the outbreak of Salmonella Javiana and Cyclospora cayetanensis.
The Mexican health secretariat and the National Commission of Food Safety (Cofepris) reported that the FDA did not identify a contamination source in Salmonella cases, as all environmental samples in Mexico were negative. However, the FDA did detect Cyclospora in two environmental Mexican samples, though it lacked sufficient evidence to determine how the contamination occurred.
The FDA linked the outbreak epidemiologically to iceberg lettuce from Taylor Farms sourced from Mexico, which was subsequently recalled. Mexico's health secretariat stated that the FDA's closure of investigations does not allow for conclusive evidence that Mexican products were the outbreak's source. The outbreak affected 12,883 people in 21 U.S. states, leading to 570 hospitalizations and two deaths.
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