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The expanding scope of the nationwide cyclospora outbreak – the protozoan parasite that causes explosive diarrhea – continues to worry consumers and health officials alike. The parasite is transmitted through human feces, which means some of that got on the food eaten by a lot of people.
Water-quality researcher Joan Rose, at Michigan State University, explains the role human sewage plays in growing food. (Spoiler alert: You aren’t going to like it.)
Rose, who first encountered cyclospora in 1995, explains there’s a lot that scientists have learned about it since, but many key questions remain. For instance: Standard sewage treatment processes kill most cyclospora that come into the systems, but not all of it. And there’s not yet a reliable way to detect extremely low levels of cyclospora to be sure that treated sewage is protozoa-free.
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