The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published an article on Thursday in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report with data from the Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network (FoodNet) that summarizes surveillance data for infections caused by pathogens transmitted commonly through food.
Surveillance data indicate that incidence of foodborne infections in the United States decreased markedly in 2020. Compared with 2017– 2019, incidence was significantly lower for infections caused by Campylobacter, Listeria, Salmonella, Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC), Shigella, and Vibrio. Incidence of infections caused by Cyclospora and Yersinia remained unchanged.
Compared with data from 2017-19, the incidence rate of illness associated with Campylobacter fell 23% and Salmonella decreased 22%. Although Salmonella infections decreased overall, infections linked to Salmonella serotype Infantis remained stable and those linked to Salmonella serotype Hadar increased.
The report did note that public health interventions intended to slow the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, stay-at-home orders and travel restrictions could have contributed to this major decline.
The report and accompanying materials are available at https://www.cdc.gov/foodnet/index.html.
