Understanding Government

The Centers for Disease Control has started to take control of a salmonella outbreak that primarily happened in Illinois, reports Chris Freeman of the Northwest Herald in McHenry County, Illinois.

The outbreak is tied to alfalfa sprouts served at the Jimmy John’s sandwich restaurant, headquartered in Champaign, Illinois.  Jimmy John’s voluntarily pulled the sprouts off the menu Tuesday night. There have been 89 such cases nationally, with 50 of those in Illinois. Freeman reports that 23 percent of the cases have resulted in hospitalization and that more could be forthcoming as patients typically complain of illness two to three weeks after they are infected.

The Obama administration has responded fairly quickly to the salmonella report: CDC stepped in yesterday, six days after the Illinois Dept. of Public Health reported a series of salmonella cases. Last week Congress passed a food safety bill precisely intended for the Food and Drug Administration to deal with tracing the origins of contaminated food and work with other bureaucracies like CDC. However, Congress still needs to approve $1.4 billion to actually implement the bill’s goals. CDC and FDA will use their current 2010 funding levels to contain this outbreak.