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The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) has issued a health alert for 1-pound packages of Organic Rancher brand organic ground beef sold at Whole Foods in stores across the U.S., according to a press release from the government agency. The beef may be contaminated with E. coli.
The 85% lean-15% fat ground beef was produced on May 22 and May 23, according to the FSIS, and has “use or freeze by” dates of June 19, 2025 and June 20, 2025. The product is also marked with the establishment number EST. 4027.
The FSIS has only issued a public health alert and not a recall because it says the products are “no longer available for purchase,” though it’s not clear when they were last on store shelves. The concern, according to the agency, is that the beef may currently be sitting in refrigerators and freezers across the country. But the lack of a recall means it also doesn’t show up on the Whole Foods product recall page. The company didn’t immediate respond to questions emailed on Wednesday.
USDA hasn’t received any reports of illness from consuming the Organic Rancher beef, though most food borne illness goes unreported. Organic Rancher notified FSIS that a test of its beef had shown up positive for E. coli, which can cause cause dehydration, bloody diarrhea, and severe stomach cramps for up to a week. Most people recover, but severe cases can cause kidney failure. Children under five and the elderly are the most at risk for severe symptoms.
Image: USDA / FSIS
In an unrelated health alert, pork lard and beef tallow products from Sulu Organics have been recalled over a lack of inspection by USDA. The fat products were created between December 2024 and March 2025 and include everything from 1.5-pound glass jars to 7-pound plastic buckets to 50-pound boxes. The items were shipped nationwide and don’t have a notice of inspection, according to the agency.
America’s food and drug safety standards have put the nation on edge after Robert F. Kennedy Jr. became the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Kennedy is the leader of the so-called “Make America Healthy Again” movement and was largely considered a fringe thinker before he was given one of the most important jobs in the federal government. Kennedy has campaigned against vaccines and is so fringe that he doesn’t even believe in germ theory.
Americans have focused less on the head of the USDA, Brooke Rollins, but she’s also an ally of Trump and the fringe right. Rollins nixed $1 billion in federal money for programs that connected local farmers with food banks and schools, providing fresh food to hungry Americans. But Rollins, like every goon in Trump’s army, has been dismantling vital programs and taking food out of the mouths of hungry people in the name of cutting “waste, fraud, and abuse.”