Enlarge By Photographer: Janice Carr The Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Agriculture use science-based risk analysis to determine what resources should be utilized in the prevention of foodborne illnesses like Ecoli. Food isn't making us as sick as we thought — almost 40% less, in fact. It's not that the numbers of foodborne illnesses have suddenly decreased, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says its methods for counting have become more precise. Since 1999, the CDC has listed the number of cases of foodborne illnesses in the USA each year as 76 million, with 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths — numbers the food industry had at times disputed. Now, after almost a decade of work, the CDC is releasing new numbers and they're 37% lower – 47.8 million cases of foodborne illness, 127,000 hospitalizations and 3,030deaths. The new numbers reflect what CDC officials say is improved surveillance of illnesses, better criteria for determining an actual food-related illness, and exclusion of international travel-related illnesses. Still, the numbers are too high, says Christopher Braden, director of CDC's division of Foodborne, Waterborne and Environmental Diseases. "That's one out of every six people, or 48 million total, getting sick from eating food in the United States each year and that's something we don't want to see," he says. The numbers come from two papers published online in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases today. The first looks at foodborne illnesses based on major pathogens such as norovirus and salmonella. The second looks at those from "unspecified agents." The only way for officials to tie an outbreak to a known pathogen is when the victim visits a doctor and has a stool sample tested, and that rarely happens with foodborne illnesses. Of the 31 major pathogens, just seven cause 90% of the illnesses, hospitalizations and death, says Braden. "This is good news because we know how to prevent many of these diseases and measure are already underway to make them lower." However, those 31 known pathogens made up only 20% of the estimated illnesses. The other 80% are classified as "unspecified agents." "You take the numbers of the total number of people who had gastrointestinal illnesses and then you subtract the number of known illnesses, and you're left with those that are due to unknown agents," says Braden. The numbers are lower now than in 1999 for several reasons: •CDC officials no longer include people who were only vomiting for a day or who only had one or two episodes of diarrhea because they know that real foodborne illnesses cause symptoms that last longer. •CDC's surveillance data is much more comprehensive than it was in 1999. While the new figures can't really be compared to the 1999 figures because they're based on improvements in data and methods, Braden says that rates of some foodborne illnesses have decreased. The most recent FoodNet surveillance data (a narrower check involving 10 states) shows about a 20% decline from 1998 to 2009, he said. The data from FoodNet for 2010 will be released this spring. The new figures are long awaited in the food industry, which believed the previous numbers to be too high. The numbers are important because they form the foundation of much of the nation's food safety policy. Regulatory agencies such as the Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Agriculture use science-based risk analysis to determine what they should focus resources on, for example. Knowing what pathogens are most likely to injure people and the foods they occur in will help set regulatory policy. FDA issued a release Tuesday saying it was implementing science-based measures to better combat foodborne illness. "We are moving down this path as quickly as possible under current authorities but eagerly await passage of new food safety legislation that would provide us with new and long overdue tools to further modernize our food safety program." Guidelines: You share in the USA TODAY community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally, and keep your language decent. Use the "Report Abuse" button to make a difference. You share in the USA TODAY community, so please keep your comments smart and civil. Don't attack other readers personally, and keep your language decent. Use the "Report Abuse" button to make a difference. Read more