Detecting Foodborne Disease Outbreaks in Florida through Consumer Complaints

Abstract

The Florida Complaint and Outbreak Reporting System (FL-CORS) database is used by the Florida Department of Health’s Food and Waterborne Disease Program (FWDP) as one of the tools to detect foodborne disease outbreaks. We present a descriptive and spatial network analysis of the FL-CORS data collected during 2015-2018. We also quantified foodborne disease outbreaks (FBO) which were investigated and confirmed due to a filed complaint and the etiological agents involved in these outbreaks.An increasing number of unique complaints filed in FL-CORS was observed during 2015 to 2018, with a sharp increase during 2017-2018 and a different seasonal pattern in 2018. The preferred mechanism of reporting varied by age group with younger people more frequently filing complaints online and older persons preferring reporting in-person or by phone. Spatial network analysis revealed that 87% of complaints had the same county of residence and county of presumed exposure. Frequency of complaints was negatively associated with linear distance between place of residence and place of exposure at zip code level. Counties located in North and Central Florida, as well as some coastal areas in South Florida had higher incidence rates of complaints. Those counties tend to have a larger population density, and some are popular vacation destinations. On average, 96 FBO were reported in Florida annually, of which 60% were confirmed with successful identification of the causative agent. 56% of the confirmed FBO were triggered by a complaint. Throughout the years, 2.4 - 2.8 FBO and 1.4 confirmed FBO were identified per 100 complaints. Ciguatera toxin was cause of 40% of all FBO in Florida, and only 28% were detected through complaints. In contrast, complaints were the main source of identifying outbreaks of Norovirus, non-typhoidal Salmonella enterica and scombroid food poisoning, as well as rare outbreaks of Clostridium perfringens, Cryptosporidium spp., Shigella spp., and Vibrio vulnificus.

Spatial Epidemiology of Salmonellosis in Florida, 2009–2018

“…Annual estimates of county resident population by age and the estimated population by ethnicity in Florida were obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau (https://data.census.gov/cedsci/, accessed October 31, 2019). As per ethical requirements for the purpose of visualization, counties with a population <20,000 were merged with other counties based on contiguous and comparable geographical locations (coastal or inland) and median household income, a total number of 58 (merged) counties were used in this study (16).…”

Digital Technologies and Open Data Sources in Marine Biotoxins’ Risk Analysis: The Case of Ciguatera Fish Poisoning

“…Only three results [ 33 , 34 , 35 ] were finally obtained using the exact keywords indicated within the digital technologies concept, combined with those related to ciguatera and risk analysis ( Table 1 ); on the other hand, the extended search for specific digital tools retrieved 13 studies containing the terms ‘software’, ‘smartphone’ and ‘website’, as semantic content relevant to the production, processing and/or communication of the data necessary for CFP risk analysis ( Table 2 ). Interestingly, only two articles combining ‘social media’ and ‘ciguatera’ within the context of risk analysis were retrieved, despite the existence of several CFP-relevant Facebook and Twitter accounts ( Supplementary Materials Table S2 ) and the popularity of social media [ 34 , 35 ]. The first one referred to social media mechanisms for food/waterborne complaints surveillance and indicated specific social media accounts serving this purpose [ 34 ].…”

“…Interestingly, only two articles combining ‘social media’ and ‘ciguatera’ within the context of risk analysis were retrieved, despite the existence of several CFP-relevant Facebook and Twitter accounts ( Supplementary Materials Table S2 ) and the popularity of social media [ 34 , 35 ]. The first one referred to social media mechanisms for food/waterborne complaints surveillance and indicated specific social media accounts serving this purpose [ 34 ]. The second one only mentioned the appearance of anecdotal reports of CFP cases on social media, such as online fishing for a, where fishers comment on their own experiences providing the opportunity for broader data collection and risk communication, but without pointing to any specific social media accounts [ 35 ].…”

A study on the improvement of the score system in the hazard analysis and critical control points prerequisite program for meat shops in Korea

“…Food poisoning incidents caused by various foods have been a common occurrence since the past [1][2][3][4]. In particular, livestock products are most likely to be contaminated with bacteria during production, slaughter, processing, distribution, and sales due to various factors such as the presence of moisture and nutrients conducive for bacterial growth [5,6].…”

“…26, 27, 28, 29, 31, 33, 35, 43, 49, 50) in the evaluation items for which the hazard severity level was high. A total 17 evaluation items (no 3,4,6,8,9,11,12,16,. 18,24, 30, 32, 34, 36, 38, 39, 40) had medium hazard severity levels.…”