SAN JUAN BAUTISTA, Calif. — California farmers voiced frustration Monday at the government's continuing advisory that consumers avoid all fresh spinach. But federal authorities defended their action, as the tally of those sickened in a nationwide E. coli outbreak rose to 114.
Though expressing concern for the health of consumers, growers said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's decision was too broad and could have a devastating financial effect even on farms not implicated in the outbreak.
"I don't think the problem is the commodity as a whole. It's not spinach. It's something specific to a ranch, a shed, an operation," said Dominic Muzzi Jr., vice president of Watsonville Produce, whose spinach cleaning and bagging business has been halted.
"The whole spinach industry is on hold until the FDA can be more specific," said Muzzi's sister Lisa, the accounting manager.
The FDA broadened its warning over the weekend to include all fresh spinach, although officials have primarily focused on the packaged greens that came from a large San Juan Bautista-based operation, Natural Selection Foods.
Food safety experts and some industry groups said federal officials have acted appropriately.
"Everyone is erring on the side of caution," said Tim Chelling, spokesman for the Irvine-based Western Growers Assn. "Food safety is a public trust. Members of our industry take it extremely seriously."
Christine Bruhn, director of the Center for Consumer Research at UC Davis, said the government action was justified by the potentially lethal nature of the bacteria, E. coli O157:H7.
"This is a dreadful, dreadful pathogen," Bruhn said. "This can lead to lifelong incapacity, permanent kidney damage or even death. It is not something that is trivial."
Twenty-one states have now reported E. coli cases. At least 60 people have been hospitalized, and 16 have developed hemolytic uremic syndrome, a condition that can lead to kidney failure.
At least one death has occurred -- a 77-year-old woman from Wisconsin. Investigators were determining whether another death in Ohio was connected to the national outbreak.
Three in four of those sickened have been women, which authorities say is because women are more likely to eat fresh greens. Many more people may have been sickened in the outbreak but weren't ill enough to seek treatment or be tested.
