CDC's Official 2026 Cyclospora Season Closes at 17,180 Cases as Three States Go Quiet on Public Reporting

CDC's May 1-Aug 31 surveillance season for cyclosporiasis officially closes, with food-safety attorney Bill Marler tallying a federal season total of 17,180 laboratory-confirmed domestically acquired cases, 922 hospitalizations, and 2 deaths across 48 states and DC, and a fifty-state combined count (including probable/pending cases) of 32,857. Marler reports that Virginia (last updated Aug 24, 234 cases), New York (last updated Aug 19, 939 cases), and Ohio (silent since Aug 13, at 5,452 cases) have all stopped publishing public case updates now that the official season has ended, even though the roughly six-week reporting lag means true totals will keep climbing for weeks. He notes only about two-thirds of confirmed cases have been linked to Taylor Farms lettuce — some 5,722 confirmed illnesses remain unattributed to any specific source — and that standard underdiagnosis multipliers suggest the true number of infections, most never tested, could run far higher than the confirmed count.