In yet another food scare in the U.S. an outbreak of salmonella which has sickened at least 172 people in 18 states and caused 11 people to be hospitalized, has yet to be narrowed down to one particular source.
Health officials are still investigating the outbreak and suspect the bacteria may have spread through some form of produce, possibly tomatoes or lettuce.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says however that it is too early to definitively link the salmonella to any specific food product, food-distribution chain, restaurants or supermarkets.
To date there have been no reported fatalities in the outbreak.
It was only recently that an outbreak of E. coli contamination was traced to fresh, packaged spinach from the Salinas Valley area of California.
That outbreak in October eventually killed three people and sickened more than 200 people in 26 states and one Canadian province.
It was finally traced back to wild pigs which are thought to have carried the bacteria from cattle feces to nearby spinach fields.
This latest scare which the CDC say may have started two weeks ago, was spotted by a national computer lab system that looks for patterns and matches in reports of food-borne illness.
The CDC has combined forces with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to try to trace the origin of the outbreak.
The states involved are Arkansas, Connecticut, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Virginia, Vermont and Wisconsin.
CDC epidemiologist Dr. Chris Braden says to date the majority of the cases have occurred in adults, and more women than men have been affected.