Economic Cost of Foodborne Illnesses in the United States

Each year, one in six people in the United States is sickened by a foodborne illness. Government, industry, and others expend considerable resources in trying to prevent these foodborne illnesses. To best marshall these resources, food industry managers and policymakers need to know both the value of these efforts to society and how to target use of these resources. Estimates of the economic burden of illness provide a conservative measure of how much people are willing to pay to prevent these illnesses. This book provides an overview of recent estimates of the economic burden imposed annually by 15 leading foodborne pathogens in the United States. It examines cost-of-illness estimates with a focus on analysing the factors that drive differences between them.