Consumer Reports has published a list of the most contaminated poultry plants based on Salmonella sample tests through January 25, 2025. Some of the plants on the list are companies linked to previous recalls and outbreaks including Foster Farms, Butterball, and Perdue.
What is This List?
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (USDA FSIS) collects samples from poultry plants, tests them for Salmonella, and publishes the results quarterly. The plants are put into three groups. Those in Category 1 are the best performing, and the plants in Category 3 are the worst.
Consumer Reports examined data from the quarter ending January 25, 2025 and published a report about the Category 3 plants “These are the worst performing plants, with results that exceed the maximum allowable percent positive for Salmonella. This designation means the conditions at these plants make it very difficult to control Salmonella contamination,” the report states.
A chart from the report shows that during this quarter 57 plants in 26 states were in Category 3. Although outbreaks can originate from plants in any category, “the plants included in the chart have been in Category 3 for most, if not all, of the past six months, meaning there is a higher risk of a Salmonella outbreak originating from one of these plants,” the report’s authors said.
Familiar Names
Some companies on the list have been linked to previous recalls and outbreaks.
Butterball
Three Butterball plants are on the Category 3 list, two in North Carolina and one in Missouri. The North Carolina plant was linked to a Salmonella Schwarzengrund outbreak in 2019.
The Salmonella outbreak, linked to Butterball raw ground turkey products, sickened six people in three states hospitalizing one of them. Butterball, based in Mount Olive, NC, issued a nationwide recall for ground turkey products on March 13, 2019, after health officials found the outbreak strain in unopened packages of Butterball ground turkey, collected from the home where all four Wisconsin case patients lived.
Perdue and the Neverending Salmonella Infantis Outbreak
In February 2019, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued its final report on a deadly Salmonella Infantis outbreak that has sickened 129 people killing one of them. At the top of the posting was an unusual note that read in part: “This investigation is over. Illnesses could continue because this Salmonella strain appears to be widespread in the chicken industry.”
ProPublica’s Salmonella Infantis Outbreak Report
In October 2021, an investigative report from ProPublica revealed that the Salmonella Infantis outbreak did not end in 2019 and has been ongoing since the time it was first announced.
During interviews with health officials, outbreak patients named several brand names of chicken, but the one named most often was Perdue, according to the report. The ProPublica team also learned that during the investigation of the outbreak, health officials in Pennsylvania and Minnesota found the outbreak strain in packages of Perdue wings, thighs, and drumsticks purchased from three different grocery stores.
Robert Tauxe, director of the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) Division of Foodborne, Waterborne, and Environmental Diseases, told ProPublica that the agency was receiving dozens of reports of illness linked to this outbreak strain each month and many patients were “gravely ill.”
The outbreak was caused by Salmonella Infantis Pattern 1080, a multi-drug-resistant strain.
Food Poisoning Bulletin, a food safety publication underwritten by Pritzker Hageman, reviewed USDA Salmonella sampling data from 2015 to June 2021. Perdue had more samples test positive for the specific outbreak strain than any other company.
The contaminated chicken products were produced at seven Perdue processing facilities located in Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, Tennessee, Virginia, and in two North Carolina cities.
The Perdue plant on the Category 3 list is a turkey processing facility in Indiana.
Related
Can I Sue Purdue for Salmonella from Chicken?
Foster Farms
Foster Farms has two California plants and a Washington plant on the Category 3 list. In 2013, the company was linked to a 29-state Salmonella Heidelberg outbreak that sickened 634 people. One of them was Noah Craten, an 18-month-old whose Salmonella infection created abscesses in his brain.
Noah’s story was featured in the Frontline report, The Trouble with Chicken. It traced the arc of Foster Farms’ decade-long Salmonella problem and spotlighted the USDA’s lack of enforcement ability.
Pritzker Hageman Wins Landmark Chicken Salmonella Lawsuit
Salmonella Attorneys Eric Hageman and David Coyle were part of the Pritzker Hageman trial team that represented little Noah. They won a $6.5 million verdict in a landmark Salmonella lawsuit against the poultry giant.
Salmonella Lawyers with Experience
If you have been sickened by poultry contaminated with Salmonella and would like a free consultation with a Salmonella lawyer, please contact the Pritzker Hageman Salmonella Legal Team. Our attorneys have represented clients in every major Salmonella outbreak in the U.S. You can reach us by calling 1-888-377-8900, sending a text to 612-261-0856, or completing the form below. There is no obligation and we don’t get paid unless we win.