{
  "id": 12820944,
  "title": "Americans' trust in the food safety net is spoiling",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/10/08/americans-trust-in-the-food-safety-net-is-spoiling",
  "topic": "health",
  "section": "Health & Medicine",
  "published": "2026-10-08T08:01:05.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Axios",
    "slug": "axios",
    "url": "https://www.axios.com/2026/10/08/food-safety-confidence-record-low-poll"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "A new Gallup poll reveals a significant drop in Americans' trust in the federal government's ability to ensure food safety on grocery store shelves. By November last year, only 11% of U.S. adults expressed \"a great deal\" of confidence, while 36% reported \"a fair amount.\" For the first time in Gallup's two-decade-long trend, a majority of Americans exhibited \"not much\" or \"no\" confidence in the government's food safety regulation capabilities. This decline in trust mirrors a similar decrease in confidence in grocery store food, which fell to a record low of 65% in 2025, down from 81% in 2019.\n\nThe growing skepticism in food safety safety is not evenly distributed across party lines. Democrats and independents are more likely to express distrust than Republicans. In 2024, 62% of Republicans had \"a great deal\" or \"fair amount\" of confidence in the government's ability to ensure food safety, while 48% of Democrats felt the same. By 2026, Democrats' confidence had plummeted to 30%, while Republicans' rose to 70%. This sharp partisan divide has widened under the second Trump administration.\n\nThe data comes during and after the federal government's declaration of the end of a Cyclospora outbreak, which caused stomach illnesses, two deaths, and over 500 hospitalizations in 21 states. Federal health officials traced the outbreak to iceberg lettuce from supplier Taylor Farms. However, this wasn't the only food-related issue that year. There were numerous overlapping recalls and FDA investigations, and health experts warned that administration cuts had weakened the public health infrastructure responsible for detecting such outbreaks. Additionally, a significant portion of Americans were concerned about the affordability of groceries, with the food-at-home Consumer Price Index (CPI) for grocery store or supermarket food purchases increasing by 2.2% between August 2025 and 2026. This situation collides with the administration's \"Make America Healthy Again\" campaign, which pushes for whole foods as part of its health initiative under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Despite these efforts, Gallup's polling suggests that Republicans have better digested the food safety message than Democrats and independents.",
  "summary": "Data: Gallup; Chart: Avery Lotz/Axios Americans' confidence in the safety of food on grocery store shelves — and in the federal government's ability to regulate it — has plummeted to new lows according to a new Gallup poll. The big picture: Simultaneous illness outbreaks put federal regulators under a microscope earlier this year, as layoffs across the nation's health apparatus were already…",
  "key_points": [
    "Only 11% of U.S. adults had great confidence in federal food safety in November 2025.",
    "Democrats' confidence in food safety dropped to 30% by 2026, from 62% in 2024.",
    "Food-at-home CPI increased by 2.2% between August 2025 and 2026."
  ],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}