The FDA has released its CORE+EP 2025 Annual Report, the yearly summary of foodborne outbreak and adverse event investigations handled by the Office of Coordinated Outbreak Response, Evaluation, & Emergency Preparedness. CORE works with CDC and state and local health departments to “find, stop, and aid in the prevention” of outbreaks linked to FDA-regulated food. Since October 2024 the office has also picked up food defense, traceability, and supply chain duties – hence the “+EP.”
The numbers
In 2025, CORE’s Signals and Surveillance Team evaluated 69 incidents – potential outbreaks, confirmed outbreaks, and certain adverse events. Of those, 26 were transferred to one of four Response Teams because the outbreak appeared to be caused by an FDA-regulated food. FDA issued 11 public health advisories.
Do the math: 26 responses, 11 advisories. FDA explains that most responses without an advisory are ones where a vehicle was never identified while the outbreak was ongoing, or there was no specific advice to give the public.
The 11 outbreaks that got advisories
According to the report, FDA advisories in 2025 covered: Salmonella Enteritidis and mini pastries (recall, Import Alert 99-19); Listeria monocytogenes and frozen shakes (recall); Listeria and ready-to-eat foods (recall, warning letter); Salmonella Montevideo and cucumbers (recall, warning letter); two separate Salmonella Enteritidis outbreaks linked to eggs (recalls); Salmonella Oranienburg and pistachio cream (recall, Import Alert 99-43); Listeria and prepared pasta meals (recall); Salmonella Anatum and Deep-brand frozen sprouted beans (recall, expanded recall, Import Alert 99-43); Salmonella Richmond and moringa powder (recall); and infant botulism and powdered infant formula.
The Director, Dr. Stic Harris, singled out three: the “historical” Salmonella cucumber outbreak, a Listeria outbreak tied to prepared meals that “challenged investigators,” and the “novel” outbreak of infant botulism linked to a single powdered infant formula brand.
Infant botulism and formula
The infant formula entry stands out in the report’s action table. Beyond the advisory, the recall, and an expanded recall, FDA lists a continued investigation, a letter to industry, and warning letters to Target, Albertsons, Kroger, and Walmart. Warning letters to four of the largest grocery retailers in the country, arising from an infant formula outbreak, is not something you see in a typical year.
As many of you know, we represent families whose babies were sickened in this outbreak. The investigation is not over, and neither is the work of figuring out how a product fed to the most vulnerable consumers we have ended up contaminated with Clostridium botulinum.
The ones the public did not hear about
Here is the part of the report I would read twice. In a footnote, FDA lists responses where a product was linked to illnesses but no advisory was issued: mangoes, cilantro, parsley, spring mix, and sprouts. FDA says this “is typically due to a lack of sufficient information about what is causing illnesses during the time of ongoing public health risk,” and that confirmed vehicles are reported on the CORE Investigation Table.
So in five outbreaks FDA knew the food, but the public got a line in a weekly table rather than a warning – and, in most cases, no brand, no grower, no retailer. That is precisely why I have asked FDA, through citizen petitions, to disclose the firms tied to outbreaks and to make recall consignee lists public. Consumers cannot protect themselves from “spring mix.” They can protect themselves from a named product sold at a named store.
And sprouts – again. Sprouts show up on this year’s list, and sprouted beans drove one of the advisories. Sprouts have been linked to outbreak after outbreak for decades, which is why I have petitioned FDA for a warning label on raw sprouts.
The rest of the report
The report also notes that CORE+EP launched Executive Incident Summary (EIS) Abstracts – redacted, high-level summaries of each Response Team investigation – and two Foodborne Outbreak Overview of Data (FOOD) Reports on food-pathogen pairs that keep causing outbreaks. Both are steps toward transparency, and both are welcome. On the food defense side, the office provided input on 66 domestic and one foreign food defense inspections and fielded more than 300 inquiries on the Food Traceability Rule.
The Director also opens by noting that the work continued “through organizational changes to the FDA in 2025.” That is a polite way of describing a hard year at the agency. The people doing this work deserve credit for getting it done.
But an annual report is a look backward. The question going forward is simple: when FDA knows what food is making people sick, will it tell the public – with names – while it still matters?
You can read the full CORE+EP 2025 Annual Report here.