How to protect yourself from cyclospora

Welcome back. According to the CDC, cyclospora cases are rising in the US. The source of the outbreak has yet to be identified. Director of Food Policy with Consumer Reports, Brian Ronholm, joins us now. Brian, thanks for joining us to talk about this. Yeah, thanks for having me on, Courtney. Okay, first of all, just explain to me what cyclospora is and where it comes from. Yeah, so cyclospora is a parasite that can be found in contaminated water, and so what ends up happening is sometimes these parasites end up in our food products for a variety of reasons, and it's typically active in warm weather months. So what we typically see on an annual basis is a spike in these cyclospora illnesses during the warm weather months. So we're smack dab in the middle of essentially cyclospora season, and so we typically see that increase, but this outbreak is a little different because it involves a particular food product which hasn't been identified yet and has led to a spike in cases in a certain number of states. So they haven't identified where it's coming from, but they have put out a list of food that may be involved that we need to be aware of, be careful about. Can you talk to us about what foods are most at risk here? Yeah, sure thing. So essentially during cyclospora season, there are certain food products that do pose a higher risk. So items like bagged salads, bagged salad mixes, bagged lettuce, I think that was the most recent kind of alert from the Michigan Department of Public Health, but there's also other food products like raspberries that have been sourced in the past. Same with basil, cilantro, mesclun mixes, a lot of those types of products that, for whatever reason, they end up being a higher risk during cyclospora season, and just consumers have to be a little extra careful when you're handling those types of food products in the warm weather months. So what's your advice when dealing with those foods? I mean, should we cut them out completely, or is there a process that can wash this off? Yeah, basically it's basic hygiene practices that we do at home that we're also very intuitive about, right? So it's obsessively washing your hands, washing utensils, making sure that doesn't mix with other food products. So it's amazing how much you can lower your risk when you're practicing just basic hygiene products, especially washing your hands. So when you're going to handle food, whether it's preparing, consuming, just obsessively watching your hands to make sure they're clean before you do that really plays a critical role. I apologize. What about the skin of the actual fruit? Like, you know, I usually do like a water vinegar wash on my fruits and vegetables. Is that going to kill this or do I need to step it up into something else? Yeah, I mean, ultimately cooking these products eliminates the risk, especially when you cook it to 150 degrees. But, you know, oftentimes we're not going to be cooking lettuce. We're not going to be putting in a pan and waiting for it to reach 150 degrees before we consume it. So the best thing you can do to lower your risk is to wash these products. Avoid maybe bag salads for the time being and focus on buying whole heads of lettuce, whole heads of fresh produce. And when you do buy things like fresh fruit, wash them off. I think a lot of us do that typically anyway. When you do that, especially with warm water, you can certainly reduce your risk that way as well. Okay, so it will reduce the risk to wash the fruits and vegetables. Yeah, and that's an important thing, Courtney, about this is you can't ever eliminate the risk except if you cook to a certain temperature. And it's just a reminder that, you know, we always have to be vigilant about food safety when it comes to handling food products. So it's practicing those hygiene habits and separating raw from fresh produce. Things like that can certainly lower your risk pretty significantly, if not eliminate it. I read that if you can switch from fresh berries to frozen berries, for example, does frozen food, does that make you any safer? Yeah, that's certainly another method to lower your risk because during the process of freezing, there is a kill step that they typically have that can eliminate pathogens, bacteria, and parasites like this. So that's certainly another method. I know a lot of folks have moved toward frozen fruits during this time of year because it's cooler too. It's nice to consume in warm weather months. But yeah, that certainly offers another alternative for consumers, especially, you know, fresh fruit can be very, very healthy and you certainly don't want to eliminate that from your diet. What are the symptoms and how soon do they show up after you've consumed the food? Yeah, that's the tricky thing, Courtney, and that's what makes these outbreaks so complex is because a lot of times these symptoms don't show up for quite a few days, sometimes a week or more. And when you're doing these types of investigations, trying to identify the source, it's really difficult to get consumers to remember what they consumed for the past week. You know, I can barely remember what I had for breakfast this morning, let alone trying to figure out what I had last week for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And that just makes these investigations a lot more complex and difficult, and it makes it much more difficult to finally get to the source of these outbreaks. How does someone know if they have this or if they have, you know, a virus or other food poisoning? Is there a way to test for it? Yeah, I mean, we all feel it when we get sick, right? It's diarrhea, it's vomiting, it's fever. The important thing too is if you experience these symptoms is to go seek medical help right away and let them know that you might have a foodborne illness. That way it gets them in their minds that to do that types of testing, because a lot of times when these symptoms show up, people don't think to test for food. This will be the time to make sure that medical professionals are aware that you think it may be foodborne so they can do those types of tests to find out. How does the cyclospora end up, let's say it's originating on lettuce. How does the cyclospora end up on the lettuce, and then how does it spread to enough heads of lettuce that it's now in dozens of states? Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of ways it can happen, right? It can be in contaminated water. So when you're using it to water the fields, it can end up in a lot of products that way. It can end up with animal feces when they're wandering the fields, certain crop fields, it can end up that way. And then when it's processed, it's another way of spreading parasites and pathogens as well. So there's certainly a lot of pathways for this to happen, and that's why it's just so important for consumers to be diligent about food safety. You know, I've read that this is more common in tropical environments. Can you remember the last time that we had an outbreak like this in the US? For cyclospora, I don't recall one this size, particularly one this concentrated. Clearly, the outbreak hotspot for this is in the southeast Michigan, northwest Ohio region, where clearly there is a particular product that was consumed in that area. It's spread to a couple other states. You know, I think currently there's this misconception that this is a nationwide outbreak. I think part of it is because there's many cases concentrated in one area, and there's so much attention focused on it. But really, right now, there's no evidence to suggest a direct link to a nationwide outbreak. And therefore, consumers shouldn't be panicked about this, but certainly remain vigilant. Yeah, so wash your hands, wash your fruits and vegetables. Can this be fatal? At this point, we haven't heard of any fatal cases regarding this particular outbreak, fortunately. You know, with vulnerable populations, there's always a higher risk for fatalities with any foodborne illness. So the very young and the very old with compromised immune systems, they're the ones at highest risk for fatalities for foodborne illness outbreaks. Is the FDA, the USDA, are they doing anything to try and tamper this outbreak? I know that they're investigating, trying to figure out where it's coming from. But are they doing anything to try and get it under control? Yeah, absolutely. They're doing their best with the resources that they have. Certainly difficult to do that with limited resources, to really conduct the thorough investigation that's required for an outbreak like this. So yeah, given the resources that they have, they're doing their best to identify the source of it. I mean, that's the main goal, is to be able to trace back to the finite source for the particular outbreak so that information can be conveyed to the public and remove those types of products from store shelves. When you talk about cyclospora being in the water supply, is there any world in which this could get into public water supplies and then into our drinking water? There's no evidence to suggest that that's the case. It is that I, Consumer Reports is aware of, but that's certainly something that we always have to be mindful of, protecting our water supply, especially it plays such an integral part of our food system. So that's why really strict water standards are so important, particularly when you're growing produce, because oftentimes we end up in situations like this, where there's a higher risk of an outbreak for fresh produce products like this. Wow, so interesting. Brian Ronholm, the Director of Food Policy with Consumer Reports, thank you for joining me. Thanks a lot, Courtney.