A Food Safety Expert Says the US Used to Fight Outbreaks with One Hand Tied Behind Its Back; After the Trump Cuts, She Says Now It’s Both
by Jerome London · Thought CatalogUpdated 3 minutes ago, September 5, 2026
The CDC’s August 27 update linked 11,458 illnesses across 20 states, at least 495 hospitalizations and two deaths to shredded iceberg lettuce served at Taco Bell. Patients fell ill between mid-June and mid-August.
The FDA and CDC publicly identified the lettuce on July 16 and named its supplier, Taylor Farms’ Mexico operations, on July 17. That same day, Taylor Farms announced a voluntary withdrawal of iceberg lettuce from central Mexico, and Taco Bell said it stopped using the lettuce.
Michigan officials say the federal warning came far too late. The state notified the CDC of an unusual spike in illnesses on June 25, then issued a public alert on July 1, food-safety guidance on July 4 and a broader lettuce advisory on July 13. By mid-July, Washtenaw County alone was recording 80 cases a day, up from a handful in late June.
The link rests on epidemiological evidence and supply-chain tracing, not a confirmed positive food sample. The FDA briefly reported a positive test on Taylor Farms lettuce before withdrawing the result as a false positive. The agency said interviews and supply-chain data still pointed to the same product.
Barbara Kowalcyk, a food safety expert at George Washington University, says decades of underfunding and Trump administration cuts have weakened the country’s ability to detect and contain outbreaks. “What you’re seeing this summer demonstrates the vulnerabilities in the system and what happens when they’re put under stress,” she said.
Administration officials reject that account. In July, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said the outbreak was “under control,” investigators had identified the source and criticism of last year’s surveillance changes was “invalid.” He said the FoodNet reductions targeted “redundant” reporting and that states were still doing the forensic work.
A White House spokesperson said the administration had not reduced the number of FDA food inspectors or other frontline staff responsible for domestic outbreak response.
Frank Yiannas, a former FDA deputy commissioner for food who served under Trump and Biden, said the response was “approaching a catastrophic level” and that parts of the system had been dismantled.
The burden fell on people like Dea Lancaster, 44, a nurse coordinator in Washtenaw County. She set aside her usual work to call dozens of sick patients a day and eventually developed an eye twitch. Counties brought in inspectors with no disease-investigation experience and trained them on the fly. Some Michigan labs ran out of tests.
Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian, Michigan’s chief medical executive, says the state took on tracing and food-safety guidance normally handled by the federal government. “I don’t think that this is sustainable,” she said. “We simply don’t have the staffing; we don’t have the bandwidth.”
Kellye O’Hara, a 62-year-old retiree in Muskegon, spent six days in the hospital and more than a month recovering. “I literally thought I was going to die on more than one occasion,” she said. She is among the patients now suing Taco Bell and Taylor Farms.
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