Food recalls are common in the United States, but some states are more affected than others.
A new analysis by regulatory compliance firm Traceone has found that California was the state most affected by government deductions between 2020 and 2024.
Food recalls are carried out when a product is found to violate laws established by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS). They are most commonly issued when a product contains undeclared allergens, harmful pathogens or foreign bodies.
California led the way with nearly 40 percent of all recalls nationwide, but other populous states were close behind. 36.4 percent of all recalls affected New York, 35.8 percent Pennsylvania.
Rounding out the top five are Illinois, where 34.8 percent of recalls issued were active, and finally Texas, with 34.5 percent of recalls affecting residents of the Lone Star State.
In total, the five largest states are home to 114.6 million Americans, or 44.1 percent of the total population, according to 2023 U.S. Census Bureau statistics.
At the other end of the spectrum, Alaska and Hawaii had the fewest number of FDA and FSIS recalls over the past four years, at 14.7 and 15.6, respectively. In the contiguous United States, Wyoming (16.1 percent), Vermont (16.4 percent) and South Dakota (16.5 percent) had the fewest number of recalls, according to Traceone.
The most common reasons for food recalls are unintended allergens in the product and contamination with harmful bacteria or viruses. According to Traceone, allergen contamination is responsible for nearly 40 percent of all recalls conducted between 2020 and 2024, while bacterial contamination, such as recalls due to the presence of salmonella, E. coli and listeria, accounts for 21 percent of all recalls.
Allergens and pathogens can cause serious illness in some people. This is why recalls are so important when errors occur in food production.
“Foodborne illness can have very serious consequences – even fatal,” Lisa R. Robinson, vice president of global food safety and public health at Ecolab, told Newsweek. “The challenge is that the pathogens responsible for foodborne illness are all naturally occurring. Salmonella and E. coli, for example, are found in the gut biome of chickens and cattle. Cronobacter and Listeria are even more common – they are found in soil and fields, so they can easily be transmitted from one environment to another.”
In recent weeks, two people have died from a listeria outbreak in several US states and more than two dozen others have been hospitalized after large quantities of sausage products were contaminated.
Other reasons for product recalls may include the presence of foreign objects such as small pieces of plastic or metal, which account for 11.6 percent of recalls between 2020 and 2024. The presence of lead in food, which is particularly dangerous, accounted for 1.7 percent of recalls.
Traceone also noted that the number of recalls per year increased from 454 to 547 between 2020 and 2023, an increase of more than 20 percent. The company expects the total number of recalls in 2024 to be “about the same” as in 2023.
