Health officials urged consumers to cook chicken thoroughly and take other precautions after an 18-state salmonella outbreak that has made hundreds sick in recent months. 
 
 A public health alert was issued for raw chicken packaged at three Foster Farms facilities in California as some 278 people have fallen ill since strains of Salmonella Heidelberg were first detected in March, the United States Department of Agriculture said in a statement Monday. 
 
 The strains were associated with chicken distributed to retail outlets in California, Oregon and Washington state, the USDA said. The illnesses have been predominantly in California but the salmonella has reached people from 18 states, the statement said. 
 
 The outbreak appears to have begun in March and the USDA was notified of the illnesses in July, said Dan Engeljohn of the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service. Investigators had a difficult time pinpointing the source of the illnesses, Englejohn said. 
 
 A spokesman for Foster Farms said no recall was in effect and that the infections were caused by eating chicken that was undercooked or improperly handled. The three facilities that packaged the chicken were all in California's Central Valley _ one in Livingston and two in Fresno. 
 
 The USDA has not directly linked the outbreak of illnesses to a specific product or production period. The USDA mark on suspect packages would read: P6137, P6137A and P7632. 
 
 State health officials were not planning a recall, but said it is essential that chicken be cooked to 165 degrees. 
 
 "This is the important public health issue," Anita Gore, spokeswoman for the California Department of Public Health. "Chicken can carry bacteria, and chicken needs to be fully cooked." 
 
 Gore also said people need to thoroughly wash their hands after handling raw meat, and anyone who believes they were infected and is showing symptoms like diarrhea and abdominal cramps should contact doctors immediately. 
 
 Salmonella is a pathogen that contaminates meat during slaughter and processing, and is especially common in undercooked chicken. 
 
 The Centers for Disease Control, which monitors the microbes that signal multi-state outbreaks of food poisoning, was working with a barebones staff because of the federal government shutdown, with all but two of the 80 staffers that normally analyze foodborne pathogens furloughed. It was not immediately clear whether the shortage affected the response to the salmonella outbreak. ||||| Late-breaking news, and I’ll update as I find out more: While the government is shut down, with food-safety personnel and disease detectives sent home and forbidden to work, a major foodborne-illness outbreak has begun. This evening, the Food Safety and Inspection Service of the US Department of Agriculture announced that “an estimated 278 illnesses … reported in 18 states” have been caused by chicken contaminated with Salmonella Heidelberg and possibly produced by the firm Foster Farms. 
 
 “FSIS is unable to link the illnesses to a specific product and a specific production period,” the agency said in an emailed alert. “The outbreak is continuing.” 
 
 (Updates to this post are at the bottom.) 
 
 This is the exact situation that CDC and other about-to-be-furloughed federal personnel warned about last week. As a reminder, a CDC staffer told me at the time: 
 
 I know that we will not be conducting multi-state outbreak investigations. States may continue to find outbreaks, but we won’t be doing the cross-state consultation and laboratory work to link outbreaks that might cross state borders. 
 
 That means that the lab work and molecular detection that can link far-apart cases and define the size and seriousness of outbreaks are not happening. At the CDC, which operates the national foodborne-detection services FoodNet and PulseNet, scientists couldn’t work on this if they wanted to; they have been locked out of their offices, lab and emails. (At a conference I attended last week, 10 percent of the speakers did not show up because they were CDC personnel and risked being fired if they traveled even voluntarily.) 
 
 In case it seems like this is not a big deal (just 300 illnesses, just some raw chicken): foodborne illness can have lifelong consequences that range from arthritis to kidney trouble to heart disease. And: The number of illnesses that can be identified in any foodborne outbreak are almost always an under-estimate. 
 
 In its statement, FSIS said: 
 
 Raw products from the facilities in question bear one of the establishment numbers inside a USDA mark of inspection or elsewhere on the package: “P6137” 
 
 “P6137A” 
 
 “P7632” The products were mainly distributed to retail outlets in California, Oregon and Washington State. 
 
 It is the second time this year that the firm at the center of this alert, Foster Farms, has been linked to a nationwide Salmonella outbreak. In July, according to the CDC, 134 people in 13 states were made ill by chicken linked to two Foster Farms slaughterhouses. 
 
 More to come on this, I am sure. 
 
 Updates, Oct. 8: 
 
 Taylor Dobbs, an excellent reporter at Vermont Public Radio, has identified the 18 states where cases have been found: Arizona, Arkansas, Alaska, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Oregon, Texas, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin. Big thanks to him for sharing his results. 
 
 There were many other overnight and early-morning stories on this; I liked JoNel Aleccia‘s at NBC News. 
 
 Foster Farms, the company named yesterday by the USDA, has issued a press release. An interesting point, which I hope to follow up on: They refer in the first paragraph to the previous outbreak this summer as having affected their “Pacific Northwest operations earlier this year.” The alert yesterday referred to California operations. If that is not a miscommunication and there are in fact different plants involved, it raises the question of whether there is a common source for the various slaughterhouses/packing plants. 
 
 Food-safety attorney Bill Marler reminds me that two of the salmonella strains in the earlier outbreak this summer were antibiotic-resistant. The CDC’s original outbreak report describes them as “resistant to amoxicillin/clavulanic acid, ampicillin, cefoxitin, ceftiofur, and ceftriaxone. The two patients with resistant isolates both were aged <12 months and required hospitalization… Resistance to third-generation cephalosporins (e.g., ceftriaxone) is clinically important because extended-spectrum cephalosporins are commonly used for treatment of severe salmonellosis in children.” 
 
 If you’re curious why the CDC’s absence from this outbreak is so critical, this description of how the CDC works in multi-state outbreaks — by organizing the investigation and deploying lab resources that no other agency possesses — is helpful. 
 
 Finally, a number of commenters have asked why this outbreak is even an issue, assuming that people are only at risk if they undercook their chicken. That assumes that people are only becoming sick from their own actions and not, for instance, eating the chicken in someone else’s home or in a restaurant. It also fails to account for salmonella’s nimbleness at spreading off raw meat to other niches in professional or home kitchens — a cutting board, a counter, a towel, a sponge, the cook’s hands — and then from there in an undetected manner to other foods. And, finally, it fails to acknowledge that some members of the population — toddlers, elderly, people with immune systems weakened by various medical treatments — are more vulnerable than others. There’s no question people should behave self-protectively. But in our regulatory system, food safety is a shared responsibility, federal, commercial and individual — and it only works when every party in that chain works to the highest standard they can. ||||| (Above PDF is the Spanish translation.) 
 
 Congressional and Public Affairs 
 
 (202) 720-9113 
 
 Richard J. McIntire 
 
 CDC Update: This outbreak investigation continues. Previously, the outbreak appeared to be over, but recent findings indicate otherwise. The number of reported infections from all seven outbreak strains of Salmonella Heidelberg returned to baseline levels in January and the outbreak appeared to be over, as noted in the previous update on January 16, 2014. However, the investigation continued and ongoing surveillance in February identified that infections from two of the previously rare outbreak strains have again exceeded the number of infections expected to be reported to PulseNet during this time of year. For more information visit CDC. 
 
 
 
 WASHINGTON, Oct. 7, 2013 - The U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is issuing a public health alert due to concerns that illness caused by strains of Salmonella Heidelberg are associated with raw chicken products produced by Foster Farms at three facilities in California. 
 
 
 
 At this point in the investigation, FSIS is unable to link the illnesses to a specific product and a specific production period. Raw products from the facilities in question bear one of the establishment numbers inside a USDA mark of inspection or elsewhere on the package: 
 
 “P6137” 
 
 “P6137A” 
 
 “P7632” 
 
 The products were mainly distributed to retail outlets in California, Oregon and Washington State. 
 
 This public health alert is being issued after an estimated 278 illnesses were recently reported in 18 states, predominantly in California. The outbreak is continuing. The investigations indicate that consumption of Foster Farms brand chicken and other brand chicken produced at Foster Farms plants are the likely source of this outbreak of Salmonella Heidelberg infections. Illnesses were linked to Foster Farms brand chicken through epidemiologic, laboratory and traceback investigations conducted by local, state, and federal officials. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is partnering with state health departments to monitor the outbreak while FSIS continues its investigation. 
 
 The investigation is ongoing and FSIS is prepared to take additional actions or expand the investigation based on new evidence. 
 
 FSIS reminds consumers to properly handle raw poultry in a manner to prevent contamination from spreading to other foods and food contact surfaces. 
 
 FSIS further reminds consumers of the critical importance of following package cooking instructions for frozen or fresh chicken products and general food safety guidelines when handling and preparing any raw meat or poultry. In particular, while cooking instructions may give a specific number of minutes of cooking for each side of the product in order to attain 165 °F internal temperature, consumers should be aware that actual time may vary depending on the cooking method (broiling, frying, or grilling) and the temperature of the product (chilled versus frozen) so it is important that the final temperature of 165 °F must be reached for safety. Please do not rely on the cooking time for each side of the product, but use a food thermometer. 
 
 
 
 All poultry products should be cooked to a safe minimum internal temperature of 165° F as determined by a food thermometer. Using a food thermometer is the only way to know that food has reached a high enough temperature to destroy foodborne bacteria. 
 
 
 
 Consumption of food contaminated with Salmonella can cause salmonellosis, one of the most common bacterial foodborne illnesses. Salmonella infections can be life-threatening, especially to those with weak immune systems, such as infants, the elderly and persons with HIV infection or undergoing chemotherapy. The most common symptoms of salmonellosis are diarrhea, abdominal cramps, and fever within eight to 72 hours. Additional symptoms may be chills, headache, nausea and vomiting that can last up to seven days. 
 
 
 
 Consumers with food safety questions can "Ask Karen," the FSIS virtual representative available 24 hours a day at AskKaren.gov. The toll-free USDA Meat and Poultry Hotline 1-888-MPHotline (1-888-674-6854) is available in English and Spanish and can be reached from l0 a.m. to 4 p.m. (Eastern Time) Monday through Friday. Recorded food safety messages are available 24 hours a day. 
 
 # 
 
 Related Information: Questions and Answers (Oct 16, 2013)
– A salmonella outbreak involving chicken has sickened about 300 people in 18 states, most of them in California, reports the AP. Authorities issued an alert for chicken packaged at one of three Foster Farms operations in California with a USDA mark of P6137, P6137A, or P7632. Here's the fun part: The CDC has a skeletal staff because of the government shutdown. "That means that the lab work and molecular detection that can link far-apart cases and define the size and seriousness of outbreaks are not happening," writes Maryn McKenna at Wired. The government alert is here.