The Produce Marketing Association released this statement about the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s announcement that two E. coli outbreaks are over.
On December 18, Center for Disease Control released two statements declaring two active outbreaks of pathogenic E. coli were over.
The investigation into these outbreaks, announced at the end of October of this year, did not yield evidence to help investigators determine the source or sources of the illnesses.
PMA is committed to advocating for produce safety and traceability best practices. This fall, a consortium of trade association partners carried out three mock “fire-drills” to determine what information is needed to link potentially tainted product with its source. Results of these traceability pilots can be found here. These tools will be available to all in the event of future outbreaks and are one more tool in the industry’s toolkit to enhance produce safety.
PMA will continue to be an advocate and resource for science and evidence-based produce safety and will provide updates on these investigations as more information becomes available.
