Contaminated green chile peppers in Colorado sickened 80 people in 1998 and 60 in 2001, according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest, which tracks food-borne illnesses. Neither outbreak involved salmonella bacteria.
A likely source of jalepeno contamination is the water used to irrigate plants or wash peppers after they're picked, said Robert B. Gravani, a food science professor at Cornell University.
One health official involved in the investigation said "loose ends" are keeping tomatoes under suspicion, but the official said they could be accounted for easily. The official said evidence is "piling up" that indicates that jalapenos are to blame.
"There's certainly no shred of doubt in my mind," the official said.
Another health official was more cautious, saying that the evidence is pointing to peppers but that there is not yet enough information to rule out tomatoes. The official said the Food and Drug Administration is enlisting more labs in the investigation so it can test jalapenos, tomatoes and cilantro more quickly.
Both officials played down the likelihood that cilantro is to blame, saying the evidence for that is thin.
Health officials fear that an acknowledgment that the outbreak was not caused by tomatoes could undermine confidence in the public health system. Officials are especially worried that it could reduce support for using statistical analysis of interviews with infected people to justify warnings and recalls, despite many previous successes, because officials decided to issue the tomato warning without waiting to find one that was contaminated.
Tomato industry groups have criticized the use of statistical analysis and say that government health officials should wait until they find a contaminated product before taking serious actions such as recalls. But government officials say that delaying a warning could cause serious harm to public health, because more people could become sick without an early alert.
The tomato industry estimates that it has lost $100 million since the June 10 warning.
"What makes it so pathetic is there has been nothing found," said Bob Spencer, co-owner of West Coast Tomato, which was forced to stop harvesting its fields in Florida and let tomatoes rot in company warehouses.
Liberal interest groups, leading trade associations and congressional critics say the failure to find the outbreak's source, after seven weeks of trying, points up the need for better food tracking systems. They contend that better labeling could quickly lead investigators to a farm that harvested suspicious produce.
Some growers and suppliers have such tracking systems in place. Critics say the FDA should require the tracking systems, which provide detailed information about the source and distribution of produce.
"There is a lot of frustration that the FDA cannot tell us where the tomatoes are from or even whether tomatoes are the cause," said Caroline Smith DeWaal, food safety director at the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
jonathan.rockoff@baltsun.com
