In 1999, an estimated 5,000 deaths, 325,000 hospitalizations and 76 million illnesses were caused by foodborne illnesses within the United States. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began tracking outbreaks starting in the 1970s. By 2012, the figures were roughly 130,000 hospitalizations and 3,000 deaths.
1850s The swill milk scandal leads to the deaths of 8,000 babies in one year alone.
1919 35 people died in 1919 from botulism from improperly canned black olives produced in California.
1967 Two women died in 1967 from botulism from canned tuna fish from the Washington Packing Corporation.
1970s 1971 1971 Bon Vivant botulism incident - 2 cases of botulism occurred in New York. 6,444 vichyssoise soup cans were recalled, including all Bon Vivant soups – more than a million cans in all. Out of 324 soup cans, five were contaminated. The company filed for bankruptcy and changed its business name to Moore & Co. The remaining products were planned for removal in 1974.
1974 Salmonella in unpasteurized apple cider caused 200 illnesses in New Jersey.
1977 Botulism in peppers served at the Trini and Carmen restaurant in Pontiac, Michigan, caused the largest outbreak of botulism poisonings in the United States up to that time. The peppers were canned at home by a former employee. Fifty-nine people were sickened.
1978 Botulism in Clovis, New Mexico. 34 people who ate at a restaurant, Colonial Park Country Club, developed clinical botulism in the second-largest outbreak in United States history. The outbreak was traced to either potato salad or a commercially prepared three-bean salad served to a group attending a banquet. Despite a thorough search of the local landfill, the discarded three-bean salad containers were never located, making it impossible to test them to confirm the source of contamination. All patients were hospitalized and 33 received trivalent botulinal antitoxin. There were two deaths.Botulism Outbreak, Clovis, New Mexico, April 8–18, 1978 New Mexico. Health Services Division, 78 pp
1980s 1983 Botulism (Type A Clostridium botulinum) in Peoria, Illinois. 28 persons were hospitalized, and 20 patients were treated with an antitoxin. 12 patients required ventilatory support and 1 death resulted. The source was sautéed onions made from fresh raw onions served on a patty melt sandwich. The sandwiches were served at the Skewer Inn Restaurant located inside Northwoods Mall.
1984/85 Hamburger thyrotoxicosis (alimentary thyrotoxicosis) outbreak among residents of southwestern Minnesota and adjacent areas of South Dakota and Iowa.Hedberg CW, et al.: An outbreak of thyrotoxicosis caused by the consumption of bovine thyroid in ground beef. N Engl J Med 1987;316:993-8.Kinney, Janet S., et al.: Community outbreak of thyrotoxicosis: Epidemiology, immunogenetic characteristics, and long-term outcome. The American Journal of Medicine, Volume 84 (January 1988), Issue 1, Pages 10–18.
1985 A Listeria outbreak in California stemmed from Mexican style soft cheese made by Jalisco. There were 52 confirmed deaths, including 19 stillbirths and 10 infant deaths. At the time, it was the deadliest foodborne illness outbreak in the United States, measured by the number of deaths, since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had begun tracking outbreaks in the 1970s. Alta Dena supplied the raw milk to Jalisco to make the cheese. Jalisco had a non-licensed technician perform the pasteurization, though pasteurized milk might have been diluted with non-pasteurized milk by the technician. On July 15, 1989, Alta Dena was absolved of any blame. As there was Salmonella serovar Typhimurium in milk from the Hillfarm Dairy in Melrose Park, Illinois, a salmonellosis outbreak occurred. At least 16,284 people were infected, all but 1,059 of them from Illinois. The others were in Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin. Two people died and the infection was a contributing factor in the deaths of "four, possibly five, others". It was the worst outbreak of salmonellosis food poisoning in United States history at the time.
1990s 1992 Botulism in whitefish in New Jersey. Four members of a Fort Lee family were stricken with botulism after eating fish bought in Jersey City.
1993 1992–1993 Jack in the Box E. coli outbreak: An E. coli O157:H7 outbreak caused by undercooked hamburgers from Jack in the Box. Four children died and nearly 700 others became sick in the Seattle area and other parts of the Pacific Northwest. The outrage resulting from the deaths placed strong political pressure on Washington and resulted in new regulations from the USDA to reform century-old practices in the meat industry. The new regulations, titled Pathogen Reduction and Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point Systems Final Rule, required a mandatory HACCP inspection system and microbial testing in meat processing plants.
1994 Botulism in El Paso, Texas. A Greek restaurant made dips from improperly stored foil-wrapped baked potatoes. Thirty people affected; 4 required mechanical ventilation. Salmonella in ice cream from Schwan's Sales Enterprises of Marshall, Minnesota. Based upon the volume of ice cream produced, the number of consumers, and the attack rate amongst consumers, it is estimated that 29,100 people in Minnesota suffered from Salmonella serovar Enteritidis gastroenteritis after eating Schwan's ice cream; and that since most of the ice cream produced during the outbreak was distributed outside Minnesota, as many as 224,000 people across the United States became sick. The contamination occurred when raw, unpasteurized eggs were hauled in a tanker truck that later carried pasteurized ice cream to the Schwan's plant. The ice cream premix was not re-pasteurized after delivery to the plant.
1996 E. coli O157:H7 in unpasteurized apple juice from Odwalla. The company was using blemished fruit and ignored warnings from in-house safety experts and specialized in selling unpasteurized juices for their supposed health benefits. 70 people in several U.S. states were stricken, mostly in the West, and in Canada. The outbreak caused one death, a 16-month-old girl from Colorado. E. coli O157:H7 in lettuce sickened at least 61 people in Illinois, Connecticut and New York in May and June 1996.
1997 Hepatitis A on frozen strawberries from Andrew & Williamson Sales Co. of San Diego, California. The strawberries were grown in Baja California, Mexico and processed by A&W. Thousands of students from Arizona, California, Georgia, Iowa, Michigan, and Tennessee may have been exposed to the virus from eating strawberries in school lunches. Over 2.6 million pounds of strawberries were recalled.
1998 A listeriosis outbreak, which was the third deadliest outbreak of foodborne illness in the United States since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention started tracking in the 1970s, resulted in 14 deaths and 4 miscarriages or stillbirths. The listeria outbreak was in hot dogs and cold cuts from Sara Lee Corporation. Some sources put the death toll as high as 21.
1999 A Sun Orchard salmonellosis outbreak occurred when more than 400 people became infected with Salmonella serovar Muenchen as a result of drinking contaminated unpasteurized orange juice. The juice was produced by Sun Orchard, based in Tempe, Arizona, and sold to restaurants, hotels, retail and catering outlets in 15 US states and 2 Canadian provinces under a variety of different brand names, including Sun Orchard, Earls, Joey Tomato's, Trader Joe's, Markon, Aloha, Sysco, and Voila! The outbreak resulted in 1 fatality, and is the largest outbreak of salmonellosis associated with unpasteurized juice. E. coli O157:H7 was found in the drinking water at the Washington County Fair in Easton, New York. Over 700 people were affected and 2 people died.
2000s 2000 Salmonella in bean sprouts from Pacific Coast Sprout Farms. They bought dry seeds in China and Australia and when germinated, the sprouts caused an outbreak from Oregon to Massachusetts. At least 67 people became ill, and 17 were hospitalized. A young girl died and 65 other people were sickened in an E. coli O157:H7 outbreak in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The source of the outbreak was two Sizzler restaurants that apparently allowed raw meat to come into contact with other food items. The infected meat was traced to the Excel meat packing plant in Colorado. There were 19 confirmed cases, 19 likely cases, and 49 suspected cases of E. coli O157:H7 in Oregon in August. The cases were linked to a Wendy's restaurant, and although beef was the suspected vector of transmission, such a link was not conclusively shown.
2002 E. coli O157:H7 in ground beef from ConAgra. 19 people became ill in California, Colorado, Michigan, South Dakota, Washington and Wyoming as a result of eating tainted hamburger from a ConAgra plant in Greeley, Colorado. The company recalled over 19 million pounds of ground beef it had manufactured, in the third largest recall in history. Listeria in processed turkey from Pilgrim's Pride. The company recalled over 27 million pounds of poultry products it had manufactured, in the largest recall in history. The outbreak killed 7 people, sickened 46, and caused 3 miscarriages. Botulism sickened 8 people in Western Alaska as a result of eating a beached beluga whale. Fifty-seven people in 7 states became ill in August and September after consuming meat contaminated with E. coli O157:H7. The tainted meat originated at the meat packing plant Emmpak Foods. Emmpak recalled 2.8 million pounds of ground beef in the aftermath of the outbreak.
2003 In September and October 2003, a hepatitis A outbreak sickened around 210 people and was linked to contaminated green onions distributed through Atlanta State Farmers' Market. A hepatitis A outbreak from a Chi-Chi's restaurant was one of the most widespread hepatitis A outbreaks in the United States, afflicting at least 640 people, killing four people in north-eastern Ohio and south-western Pennsylvania in late 2003. The outbreak was blamed on tainted green onions at a Chi-Chi's restaurant in Monaca, Pennsylvania.
2006 E. coli O157:H7 from Taco Bell in South Plainfield, New Jersey and Long Island. 39 people in central New Jersey and on Long Island were sickened and suffered from hemolytic uremic syndrome. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention at first believed the E. coli O157:H7 to be in the green onions. The FDA on December 13, 2006, said it could not confirm that scallions were the cause of the problem, as previously suspected, and that it was not ruling out any food as a possible culprit. It was later suspected that infected lettuce was the cause. 2006 North American E. coli outbreak. E. coli O157:H7 in bagged organic spinach packaged by Natural Selection Foods and most likely supplied by Earthbound Farm in San Juan Bautista. 3 dead, and 198 people reported sickened by the outbreak across 25 U.S. states, and 1 person reported sickened by the outbreak in Ontario.
2007 On December 27, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health warned not to drink milk or milk-related products from Whittier Farms in Shrewsbury, MA due to a Listeria contamination that resulted in two deaths. On October 11, food manufacturer ConAgra asked stores to pull its Banquet and generic brand chicken and turkey pot pies due to 152 cases of salmonellosis in 31 states being linked to the consumption of ConAgra pot pies, with 20 people hospitalized. By October 12, a full recall was announced, affecting all varieties of frozen pot pies sold under the brands Banquet, Albertson's, Food Lion, Great Value, Hill Country Fare, Kirkwood, Kroger, Meijer, and Western Family. The recalled pot pies included all varieties in single-serving packages bearing the number P-9 or "Est. 1059" printed on the side of the package.