Every batch of a raw-milk cheddar is off the shelves after 13 illnesses

Of the 13 people sickened in a multistate E. coli outbreak, eight were hospitalized, and three went on to develop hemolytic uremic syndrome, a complication that attacks the kidneys. Investigators tied the illnesses to Graziers raw milk cheese made by Sierra Nevada Cheese Company of Willows, California. The company has recalled all of it, medium and sharp cheddar included.

Most recalls name a lot code and a date range. This one names neither: the company said the investigation “has not been narrowed to a specific lot, date code, or production date,” so no batch could be cleared.

A Recall With No Lot Code to Narrow It

Every Graziers raw milk cheese in distribution is covered, whatever the size of the package or the day it was made. For a producer, that is the broadest form a recall can take, since it pulls product that may never have been contaminated along with product that may have been, and it removes the cheddar, the jack and the jalapeno jack from sale at once. The company’s decision followed a call from the FDA, which had traced illnesses back to the cheese through patient interviews and recommended the recall to the company directly, according to the agency’s own outbreak narrative.

Neither document gives sell-by dates, which leaves package size and brand as the only identifiers. The outbreak page describes the product as grass-fed raw milk cheese sold in 8-ounce or 16-ounce retail packages and 5-pound wholesale loaves, and the recall adds the 40-pound blocks of cheddar. A shopper holding a plain wedge from a deli case has little to go on except the Graziers name, which is the practical reason the company and the agency chose a blanket recall over a lot-by-lot one.

The timeline is short. Per the FDA’s outbreak page, the agency contacted the company on September 24, and the company agreed that same day to recall all Graziers raw milk cheeses. The formal notice carries a September 28 date.

Thirteen Cases Across Nine States

The number in the outbreak is a national one. FDA’s outbreak investigation page counts 13 illnesses spread over California, Colorado, Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Nevada, Oregon, Tennessee and Utah, with 8 hospitalizations, 3 cases of hemolytic uremic syndrome and no deaths. It is a tally for the whole multistate outbreak, not the toll of any one state’s health department, and FDA and CDC worked with state and local officials to assemble it.

Interviews pointed one way. Nine ill people were interviewed, and all nine reported eating the recalled cheese before they became sick. The latest illness onset on the page, August 26, trails the September 25 update by a month, a gap that reflects how long confirmed cases take to be reported rather than any sign that the outbreak ended on that date.

E. coli O26:H11 and the Kidney Risk

O26:H11 is a Shiga toxin-producing strain, the family of E. coli that can do real damage well beyond the gut. Per CDC’s symptoms page, most infected people have diarrhea that can be bloody or watery and stomach cramps that can be severe, with some also vomiting or running a low fever. The agency says in its E. coli overview that infection with these strains “can lead to a serious health condition called hemolytic uremic syndrome,” which in turn can cause kidney failure, permanent health problems and death. It lists children younger than 5, adults 65 and older and people with weakened immune systems among those at higher risk.

Raw milk cheese is made without pasteurizing the milk, so any bacteria in the milk go into the vat alive, and a product with a long shelf life can sit in a home refrigerator or freezer well after a store pulls it. Fox Business, reporting on the FDA’s warning, relayed the agency’s instruction not to eat, sell or serve the recalled Graziers cheeses and noted that symptoms can surface up to nine days after eating them. That is the sense in which “off the shelves” is only half the story: the cheese leaves the store before it leaves the kitchen.

The severity numbers carry as much weight as the case count. Eight admissions among 13 patients means more than six in ten of the people identified so far needed inpatient care, and the three cases of hemolytic uremic syndrome are the ones clinicians watch most closely, because kidney injury can outlast the infection that set it off. No deaths have been reported in the outbreak page’s latest update.

Still open after the recall is a gap that the notice does not close. Because the investigation could not isolate a lot, no one has publicly identified where in the production chain, from milk to aging room, the bacteria entered. FDA and CDC describe the work as continuing, and the only fixed point so far is the September 25 case count of 13 people in nine states, which later updates on the FDA recalls and safety alerts index may revise.

This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.

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