Bailee Henderson

This episode of Food Safety Five discusses updated USDA-FSIS guidance on Listeria testing in RTE facilities, the latest on the Boar’s Head facility behind the fatal outbreak of 2024, and a real-world Listeria “Seek and Destroy” success story.

In a recent 60 Minutes interview, U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said FDA will address the “generally recognized as safe” (GRAS) “loophole,” which allows ingredients into the food supply without FDA review, while saying he does not plan to regulate ultra-processed foods.

New data from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) shows the most recent and complete picture of workforce attrition at federal agencies responsible for food safety and public health.

Like the Healthy Florida First initiative’s previous reports on toxic heavy metals in candy and infant formula, details that would help contextualize the findings have not been disclosed, such as the sampling and testing methodology or relevant safety thresholds

The first reports from the MAHA-aligned Healthy Florida First initiatives raised concern about toxic heavy metals in infant formula and candy, but toxicologists say a lack of transparency around the methodology and risk assessment makes the findings difficult for experts to interpret and raises questions about the relevance to consumer health.

Boar’s Head has reopened its Jarratt, Virginia production facility, which was closed after being implicated in a fatal listeriosis outbreak in 2024. The company says the plant, which had exhibited serious food safety and hygiene violations, has undergone renovations and enhancements.

In the wake of a high-profile safety incidents involving powdered infant formula, FAO/WHO have issued a call for experts and data to support JEMRA in conducting a risk assessment that will help the Codex Committee on Food Hygiene update the Codex Alimentarius standards for powdered formula.

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has signed into law the Protecting Against Forever Chemicals Act, which prohibits statewide the manufacture and sale of certain consumer goods that contain intentionally added per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).

Following the ByHeart botulism outbreak, FDA intends to begin testing infant formula products and ingredients for Clostridium botulinum to help determine whether contamination by the pathogen is a “foreseeable hazard that companies could test for.”

The U.S. Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) Education Fund’s newly published Food for Thought report outlines food recalls and foodborne illness outbreak investigations that occurred in 2025 and provides recommendations for improving the U.S. food recall system.