If one thing can ruin summer fun in the sun, it’s a three-week bout of explosive diarrhea. And for thousands of Americans—including nearly 100 Nebraskans—that’s already a reality.
A microscopic parasite called Cyclospora cayetanensis, or cyclospora for short, is causing intestinal distress for Americans this summer. Cyclospora gives humans an illness named after the parasite itself: Cyclosporiasis, which is not usually life-threatening.
Cyclosporiasis is the second harmful parasite that has resurged in the last two years. New World screwworm cases are on the rise as well, infecting and sometimes killing livestock.
Cattle are dying, humans are spending summer in the bathroom, and the agencies responsible for overseeing and mitigating outbreaks are suffering from budget cuts and mass layoffs.
It’s not a coincidence.
Cyclospora wreaking havoc on America’s bowels
After decades of research, scientists have found just one place where the parasite cyclospora grows: the small human intestine. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), “People with cyclospora may or may not experience symptoms. Cyclospora infects the small intestine (bowel) and usually causes watery diarrhea with frequent and sometimes explosive bowel movements.”
Other common symptoms include loss of appetite, weight loss, cramping, bloating, increased gas, nausea, and fatigue. Rare symptoms include vomiting, body aches, headache, low-grade fever, and other flu-like symptoms.
Cyclospora spreads by laying its eggs in the small intestine and sending them out into the world via its most unpleasant symptom: watery diarrhea. That finds its way into the food supply, either via a worker who hasn’t washed their hands thoroughly or through the water system as it irrigates plants. Humans who eat the contaminated food up to several weeks later can become ill.
“In a global food system, where a lot of fresh produce is shipped across the world, inadequate hand-washing facilities or a leaky latrine on a single farm could sicken many people, even thousands of miles away,” Alice Callahan and Caroline Hopkins Legaspi said in a New York Times article.
The CDC recommends avoiding food that may be contaminated and following safe food-handling practices like thoroughly washing produce to prevent infection.
Excessive funding cuts linked to parasitic outbreaks
In January 2025, Elon Musk vowed to take a chainsaw to federal government programs and cut waste, fraud, and abuse to reduce the US deficit. Not only did his Department of Government Efficiency fail to reduce the deficit, but cuts to the Department of Agriculture (USDA), such as the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, have hindered the USDA’s ability to contain a recent outbreak of New World screwworm.
Similar cuts were made last year by US Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who directly oversees the CDC. Kennedy cut 25% of the CDC’s workforce by the end of 2025, including at the Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network (FoodNet), a division of the CDC. In a statement to NBC News in August 2025 amid the layoffs, a spokesperson for the CDC mentioned cyclospora as one of the pathogens they had to remove from surveilling. As of press time, more than 11,500 cases of cyclosporiasis have been reported in 41 states, making this the largest cyclosporiasis outbreak in American history.
The outbreak has come to Nebraska in visible ways. The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services said Monday that Nebraska has identified 91 cases of cyclosporiasis since May. Additionally, GroundUP Restaurants, the company that owns Lincoln-based eating establishments like Stauffer’s Café & Pie Shoppe, Vic’s Pizza, and Honest Abe’s, has pulled certain items from their menus due to a possible link between cyclosporiasis and specific produce.
“Due to the recent outbreak of cyclosporiasis, we have made the decision to stop selling leafy green products at this time for the safety of our guests,” the company said on Facebook. “All GroundUP Restaurants have pulled bagged lettuce, spinach, berries, and other ingredients linked to this outbreak to be fully safe.”
Kennedy said on Tuesday the outbreak is “under control.” He has also falsely argued that the measles vaccine causes autism, once likening it to the Holocaust. Meanwhile, measles just hit a 35-year record high, linked directly to vaccine skepticism.
Kennedy additionally claimed the COVID vaccine was dangerous for pregnant women, though the opposite has proven true.
