The infections have been linked to some raw red plum, red Roma, round red tomatoes, and products containing these raw tomatoes. Investigations conducted by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) together with public health officials and the U.S.  Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have traced the source of some of the outbreaks to restaurants using the tomatoes, but how they came to be contaminated remains to be seen.

Americans continued getting infected at a rate of about 20 people per day even after the June 7 FDA warning not to eat three popular tomato varieties caused restaurants, distributors and grocery stores to dump tomatoes by the crate at an estimated cost of $100 million to $250 million.

 "The two weeks following the FDA announcement were disastrous for growers and for many of us in the supply chain", says Martin Mazzanti from "The Produce Exchange" in the US. "We dumped and sold tomatoes for significant losses. At this point in time, Vine Ripes from California are being sold with confidence and Romas from Baja California are still being approached cautiously by many receivers".

"Overall, from June 8^th to July 26^th our tomato sales are down by 6%", says Mr. Mazzanti, pointing that "Hot House Tomatoes were down just 1% with FOB prices that were double that of normal for this time of year. Overall, distribution, pricing and merchandising at the store level were positively affected in this segment by the loss of Vine Ripes and Roma tomatoes". As for the Cherry's Grape segment, "it was up 7% with double normal FOB prices. Grape tomatoes peaked at $36 - $38 for 20 lbs of fruit. Sales are still strong and moving closer to normal". The Vine Ripes were down 10% & the Roma Segment was down 15%".

The clusters of illnesses identified in Texas and other states in the USA among persons who ate at restaurants have led the authorities to broaden the investigation to include food items that are commonly consumed with tomatoes.

Victims' ages range from 1 to 99 years and 49% are female; while no deaths have been officially attributed to the outbreak, at least 105 people have been hospitalized and it is suspected that many more were affected.

The FDA has been able to trace infected tomatoes down the distribution chain to certain farms in Mexico and Florida. Consequently, teams started conducting joint inspections of the farms together with regulators in Mexico and Florida, distribution points and other critical points along the supply chain where the tomatoes may have become contaminated.

Being cautious, even one of the world's leading fast food chains, McDonald's, stopped serving sliced tomatoes for a while due to concern over Salmonella. Moreover, Wal-Mart and some US grocery stores have shelved several varieties of the fruits, while federal investigators determine where the tainted tomatoes came from.

       At the beginning of July, U.S. health officials added hot peppers and cilantro as potential suspects as well

"The growers are the ultimate victims of this outbreak", says Meir Peretz, NAFTA PD manager, adding that "the government is trying to help the public but takes the easy route and the tomato growers are the black sheep".

What can they do, I ask him. "Growers can help by instituting a traceability program that is universal across the industry. For example, when they had the recall of the contaminated ground beef it was relatively easy, and it did not make as much headlines as tomatoes. The reason for that being, beef is subject to stricter rules and trace back is much easier. I believe that in the produce business we need to have a similar recall management system.  This will shorten the time to discovering the contamination source".