Experts have noted that listeria typically does not cause severe illness in healthy people. But the very young and old, along with anyone who has a weakened immune system, can become severely ill from listeria infection.
“Listeria causes about 1,600 infections a year and about three to four outbreaks a year in the United States,” said Dr. Robert Glatter, an emergency medicine physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City.
About 260 deaths occur as a result — far fewer than the number linked to salmonella, another foodborne illness, the CDC said.
Dr. Brendan Jackson, a medical epidemiologist at the CDC, said the number of severe cases of listeria is “actually rare.”
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“If you have eaten a food that has been recalled and you don’t have any symptoms, there is no need to worry,” he said. But if symptoms do develop over the next few weeks, see your doctor, Jackson said.
Glatter agreed that “most people who eat food contaminated by listeria won’t become very ill. They can have nausea, vomiting, muscle ache and diarrhea.”
However, he added, “there is a more invasive type of illness that can affect people with weakened immune systems, such as those who have HIV, or people with diabetes, heart disease, pregnant women, infants and the frail elderly.”
In these people, listeria can cause serious illness, including meningitis and blood poisoning. “It can also result in stillborn infants and miscarriages,” he said.
The bacteria are usually associated with failure to keep foods cool enough or keeping foods too long, he added.