Taylor Farms has pulled iceberg lettuce sourced from central Mexico out of the US market after federal investigators linked a cyclosporiasis outbreak to shredded lettuce served at Taco Bell restaurants in five states.
The company said Friday that Taylor Farms de Mexico made the move after receiving information from the Food and Drug Administration. Taylor Farms said the FDA’s traceback work pointed to a specific independent farm as a possible source of the outbreak, and that the farm accounts for less than 1 percent of the US iceberg lettuce supply. The company said it removed all iceberg lettuce from the region anyway, indefinitely.
That is a broad withdrawal for a product category most customers never see as a branded Taylor Farms item. The company has said it sells more than $7 billion in produce annually and makes two out of every five salad kits sold in grocery stores. Its role is often buried in the supply chain, which is exactly where foodborne outbreak investigations become tedious and slow.
Reuters reported, citing a source, that Taylor Farms told customers Thursday to pull shredded lettuce from distribution, including Taco Bell and food distributor Sysco. According to Reuters, the lettuce had first been produced as 5-pound bags at a facility in Guanajuato, Mexico.
Taco Bell said Thursday that the affected supplier ingredient was being removed from its national supply chain and would be replaced within 24 hours in select states. The company did not name Taylor Farms in that statement.
What investigators have connected so far
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the FDA have said the outbreak has been linked to shredded iceberg lettuce served at Taco Bell locations in Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and West Virginia. The illness involved is cyclosporiasis, caused by a parasite. The investigation has not pinned every reported case on Taco Bell.
The CDC has also said it is examining illnesses and outbreaks in other states that are unrelated to the Taco Bell-linked cluster. Taylor Farms has not identified additional companies or consumer products to avoid.
Michigan’s health department has reported more than 5,000 cyclosporiasis cases in the state, including 102 reports of hospitalization. The available public information does not say how many of those cases investigators have tied to Taco Bell, Taylor Farms, or the lettuce from central Mexico.
The tracing system is doing this the hard way
ProPublica reporter Annie Waldman has reported that the federal tracing effort is operating after more than 240 consumer safety specialists left during Trump administration cuts to federal health agencies. ProPublica also reported that the CDC scaled back FoodNet, its Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network that worked with 10 states.
The Washington Post reported that the FDA also delayed its Food Traceability Final Rule from January 20, 2026, to July 20, 2028. That rule would require standardized records for certain foods and shipments. In an outbreak investigation, that kind of boring paperwork is the machinery that can turn “some lettuce, somewhere” into a farm name faster.
For now, Taylor Farms says the FDA traceback points to one independent farm as the potential source, while the company has removed all central Mexico iceberg lettuce from the US market. Federal and state investigators are still sorting out how far the outbreak reaches.
This story draws on original reporting from The Verge.
