Romaine lettuce grown on an unnamed farm has been blamed for an outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 illnesses that sickened 60 people in 10 states between October 10th and December 4th. CDC believes that the outbreak is now over.
Missouri reported the largest number of illnesses (37), but outbreak cases also occurred in Arizona (1), Arkansas (2), Georgia (1), Illinois (9), Indiana (2), Kansas (3), Kentucky (1), Minnesota (3) and Nebraska (1). Approximately two-thirds of the outbreak victims were hospitalized, and two people developed hemolytic uremic syndrome. Most of the illnesses occurred during the second half of October 2011.
The outbreak puzzled Missouri public health authorities for weeks. Illnesses appeared to be linked epidemiologically to salad bars located in supermarkets – mainly in the St. Louis area. Schnucks, the supermarket chain that appeared to be linked to the outbreak, acted quickly to remove any potentially offending produce items from its salad bars.
The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services analyzed 55 food samples in connection with the St. Louis area outbreak cases, but was unable to find a single E. coli-positive sample. Patient interviews and a comparison of eating patterns with those of healthy individuals in Missouri and other affected states pointed to romaine lettuce as a probable source of the illnesses.
Traceback studies determined that the romaine lettuce served at all of the Schnucks stores came from a single lettuce processing facility via a single distributor. Lettuce from the same farm also was supplied to university campuses in Minnesota and Missouri during the time of the outbreak illnesses.
An investigation was carried out at the implicated farm (identified by CDC simply as “Farm A”), but preliminary findings did not point to a source for the contamination. The farm was not in production during the investigation.
CDC considers this outbreak to be over, and has not issued outbreak-specific advice to consumers.
eFoodAlert 
Thank you for your response. Maybe I’m wrong about the cause as the symptoms appeared within nine hours. In any case I’m going to avoid ready to eat and bagged salads! The illness did not escalate to the point that I sought medical help and abated as quickly as it began. Apparently only a medically diagnosed case can be reported. If it happens again I’ll go to my doctor for documentation purposes, if nothing else.
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I think that’s a good plan. I always avoid ready-to-eat and bagged salads! Glad your illness wasn’t more serious.
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On Monday, December 5, 2011 (noon) I ate a Publix supermarket Turkey Cobb salad with one Ranch dressing and one Caesar dressing and became ill that night for three days. That was the only thing I ate that day. (Huntcrest location, Old Peachtree Rd., Lawrenceville, GA)
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Robert, your experience is a good illustration of why it is so difficult to get a true picture of the number of illnesses caused by contaminated food. CDC estimates that only one out of every 26 cases of E. coli O157:H7 is ever diagnosed and reported. I don’t know whether you were sickened by the contaminated romaine lettuce that caused this outbreak – the usual incubation period for E. coli O157:H7 is 3-4 days, but can be as short as one day. It’s also possible that your illness was the result of having eaten some other contaminated food a couple of days earlier.
Phyllis Entis, MSc., SM(NRCM) eFoodAlert
URL: https://efoodalert.wordpress.com Email: foodbuglady@gmail.com
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