U.S. food safety monitoring is conducted by a fragmented network of state and federal agencies responsible for detecting, investigating, and halting foodborne illness outbreaks. A central component of this network is the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s FoodNet (Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network), established after deadly E. coli outbreaks in the early 1990s. Participating states historically contacted laboratories to compile case data that help signal emerging problems.
In the second term of President Donald Trump, the administration implemented deep public health funding reductions and workforce cuts. Those changes included the curtailment of FoodNet’s mandatory tracking for cyclospora and five other pathogens, altering the scope of active surveillance conducted by the program.
Food safety leaders warn that billions in public health budget cuts and the firing of thousands of federal health agency employees have weakened the nation’s ability to detect and respond to foodborne outbreaks. The article reports that programmatic changes and staff reductions have limited the capacity of federal teams that investigate and inspect food manufacturing and distribution.
State and local health departments have also been affected: reduced federal support and staffing shortages have forced some health departments to scale back prevention programs and reassign personnel to urgent response tasks.
Under the revised FoodNet rules, the 10 states that form the program’s surveillance sample — intended to represent a cross-section of the population — no longer must report illnesses from certain pathogens. The article highlights two examples:
Listeria: Although less common than some other foodborne bacteria, listeria infections are severe. Reported facts include high hospitalization rates (about 95% of diagnosed patients) and an estimated 170 to 260 deaths annually in the U.S. Complications can include miscarriage, convulsions, and organ-damaging sepsis. Experts in the report emphasize that listeria outbreaks are hard to identify and that removing mandatory surveillance signals increases risk.
Campylobacter: Often contracted from raw or undercooked poultry, campylobacter is estimated to sicken about 1.5 million people each year in the U.S. States no longer are required to report campylobacter cases to FoodNet under the changes described in the article.
The piece also notes that cyclospora was removed from mandatory tracking even as it has caused large, multi-state illness clusters.
The article describes a persistent decline in FDA inspections of food manufacturers over the preceding decade: facility inspections fell from about 10,641 in 2011 to roughly 4,500 a decade later. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported that the FDA had not met congressionally mandated inspection targets since 2018 and documented a limited number of investigators for domestic and foreign inspections.
A GAO figure cited in the article notes 432 investigators for domestic and foreign inspections in 2024. The administration later cut 3,500 FDA jobs as part of broader spending reductions, further reducing on-the-ground capacity for inspections and investigations.
Michigan is highlighted as the state with the largest reported number of cyclosporiasis cases — more than 7,000 — and as an example of local agencies stretched thin by outbreak response demands. In Washtenaw County, public health staff pulled away from other programs, including immunizations and sexual health services, to investigate outbreaks and to conduct case interviews. Investigations require time-consuming work such as reviewing weeks-old takeout receipts, bank records, and patient recollections to trace sources.
Michigan’s chief medical executive, quoted in the article, warned that an underfunded public health system is already showing consequences and that while cyclospora is the current threat, reduced capacity could mean the system will fail to detect future, potentially deadlier pathogens.
HHS representatives disputed that FoodNet changes or staffing reductions increased the risk of harder-to-detect outbreaks. An HHS spokesperson stated that FDA investigators were not affected by staffing changes or force reductions and pointed to a proposed $33 million increase for food safety activities in the FY 2027 presidential budget request. The spokesperson also said the CDC never stopped monitoring illnesses caused by cyclospora.
The article notes that the CDC maintains other passive surveillance systems, but experts emphasize that these systems rely on state reporting and offer no assurance about timeliness; there is no federal requirement dictating how quickly states must report cases to CDC systems.
Food safety advocates and public health experts cited in the article express concern that reduced federal oversight, fewer mandatory surveillance requirements in FoodNet, declining FDA inspection activity, and constrained state health departments will slow detection and complicate outbreak response. They warn that if surveillance and inspection capacities continue to shrink, the next major outbreak could involve a pathogen with greater severity and higher mortality than cyclospora.
The article presents the cyclospora outbreak and the Michigan response as indicators of shortcomings in the current system rather than as isolated events. It reports disagreement between federal officials, who assert ongoing monitoring and proposed budget increases, and independent experts and local officials, who describe an eroded ability to find and stop foodborne threats quickly.
(Authors of the original report: Kate Wells and Stephanie Armour. Source: KFF Health News. Specific statements, figures, and quotes are reported as presented in the source article.)