TIP OF THE ICEBERG

Trump’s FDA Makes Embarrassing Mistake in Hunt for Origin of Diarrhea Outbreak

Medical authorities thought they had traced the source of the grim parasitic outbreak to a bad batch of lettuce.

The mystery surrounding the grim spread of a parasite that causes “explosive” diarrhea has taken a further twist after it emerged that medical authorities may have wrongly identified the source of the outbreak. The Food and Drug Administration said Saturday that cases of cyclospora had been traced back to a bad batch of iceberg lettuce from Taylor Farms, which supplies food to Taco Bell. The FDA reversed its position on Sunday, announcing that it had reviewed the initial analysis and found it was a false positive. In a statement noting that the FDA had apologized for the error, Taylor Farms added that its “thoughts remain with everyone who has fallen ill” in the outbreak. The disease has caused no deaths but resulted in the hospitalization of almost 100 people, with at least 1,600 cases across the country in what the Centers for Disease Control is describing as a major outbreak. Symptoms, which can take as long as two weeks to show, include sudden, watery bowel movements lasting for days, along with abrupt loss of appetite and accompanying weight loss.