New Figures Season Food-Illness Debate

Linda Blackman, a hairdresser in the tiny Mendocino County town of Willits, was expecting to enjoy a dinner of shrimp soup, beans and salsa last month at the Mexican restaurant next to her beauty parlor.

Instead, she and 331 other diners came down with nausea and high fever. “I was sicker than a dog,” she said. “I may never eat out again.”

Like Blackman, increasing numbers of Americans are growing wary of everything from hamburgers to home fries, enchiladas to ice cream. Some polls show that consumers are more worried about tainted meat than violent crime.

No wonder. The most frequently cited statistics about food-borne illness estimate 81 million cases a year, of which 9,100 end in death. These figures help form the foundation of a Clinton administration initiative to toughen national food laws.

But preliminary data from a new program at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta suggest that those estimates are overstated--or, as the food industry says, wildly exaggerated.

“Policy is being framed by false statistics,” said Peter Barton Hutt, a veteran Washington regulatory lawyer who teaches food and drug law at Harvard University. “Nobody has the vaguest idea, so people make up numbers depending on what their agenda is. To rely on these numbers is just dead wrong.”

Final CDC estimates are expected by the end of the year and food producers and the restaurant industry already are planning to use them to deflect proposals for tougher inspections of their facilities.

“Using the old numbers really hypes concern from consumers, which gets action in Washington,” said Stacey Zawel, a food safety expert for the Grocery Manufacturers of America.

But consumer groups say that, even if the toll of food-borne illness is lower than many now believe, Americans still will not accept it.

“The public doesn’t expect to die from food,” said Caroline Smith DeWaal of the Center for Science in the Public Interest. “Even 1,000 deaths would be too many if they are linked to a problem that’s preventable.”

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said that she intends to introduce legislation next year that, among other provisions, would tighten controls over imported produce, less than 3% of which is now inspected.

“Even if the latest numbers show fewer illnesses or deaths, it is still a significant problem and one that in my judgment cries out for congressional action,” Collins said.

The CDC tracks laboratory-confirmed infections from seven major pathogens, including salmonella and E. coli 0157:H7. Those seven bugs represent a fraction of the bacteria, viruses, chemicals and toxins that can contaminate food. However, a government report estimated that they caused half of all reported outbreaks of food-borne illnesses in the first six months of this year and 80% of the outbreaks for which a cause could be identified.

Extrapolating from data from five states, CDC projected a nationwide total of 8 million cases of foodborne illness last year from these seven bugs. Even if the total for all causes is two or three times higher, that would still fall far short of 81 million cases.

Dr. Fred Angulo, head of the CDC program that tracks food-borne illness, said the agency’s estimate of deaths would probably fall between 1,000 and the old estimate of 9,000. By comparison, skin cancer claims about 9,200 victims a year.

Before Angulo’s program, called FoodNet, was launched two years ago, the CDC estimated that the salmonella bacterium, most commonly found in undercooked eggs and chicken, caused 400,000 to 4 million illnesses a year, 1,000 of which ended in death. Angulo said that new estimates would show 1.4 million cases and 500 deaths.

Men seem more prone to food-borne illness than women. They are twice as likely as women to be infected with vibrio, a rare and potentially lethal bacterium found in raw oysters. And men are more likely to catch common bugs found in undercooked poultry and meat.

The old estimates of food-borne illness dating from the 1980s, actually were phrased as ranges: from 6.5 million to 81 million illnesses a year and from 523 to 9,100 deaths. Most often, only the upper limit was cited.

The Clinton administration is trying to improve coordination of the 12 agencies responsible for food safety. Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala, Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Carol Browner are leading an effort to develop a national food safety “vision.”

The goals are “safe, healthy and affordable” food, a balance between prevention of illness and enforcement of penalties against those responsible for contaminated food and a commitment to fund more research and public health programs.

Local health officials worry that, regardless of the estimates, Americans are becoming more vulnerable to food-borne illness as they eat more meals in restaurants and consume more imported produce. Moreover, the elderly and chronically ill, who are particularly prone to such diseases, represent a growing share of the population.

Mendocino County health officials have had to scramble to contain a significant outbreak of shigellosis, dysentery caused by a shigella bacterium transmitted by fecal contamination of produce or contact with an infected person. It causes diarrhea and high fever and can lead to seizures in infants and toddlers.

The outbreak is believed to have started at the popular Mexican restaurant in Willits where Blackman fell ill. Of the 332 victims, four were hospitalized, although none died. Officials are not sure if the problem came from contaminated salsa ingredients or from an infected restaurant worker who passed the bug on while preparing meals.

Shigella accounted for about 15% of the illnesses confirmed by FoodNet in 1997, making it the third most common source of infections. But Carol Whittingslow, the Mendocino County health department’s nursing director, had not seen a shigellosis outbreak in 20 years of service.

Whittingslow said she was concerned that, if estimates of food-borne illnesses are ratcheted down, the result might be a lower priority for combating them.

“We can estimate what we think the numbers ought to be,” she said, “but the important thing is the impact on people.”