I’ve been suing people for melons for years. I’m not happy about it. But here it is again.
Let me walk you through what I’ve learned about this fruit through 30 years of testimonies, hospital visits, and funerals.
Outbreaks You Should Know About
In 2011, Jensen Farms in Hawley, Colorado, shipped cantaloupes that killed 33 Americans and sickened 147 in 28 states. Almost everyone who was sick was hospitalized. maternity. newborn baby. legacy. FDA inspectors discovered a packing house with water pooling on the floor, old equipment that could not be properly cleaned, and fresh truck tires from a nearby livestock operation rolling right through the facility. 33 people died. And the owner of Jensen Farms was placed on probation.
In 2012, Chamberlain Farms sent cantaloupes to 24 states that sickened 261 people and killed three.
In 2023, Malichita and Rudy brand melons from Mexico infected 595 people in the United States and Canada (407 Americans and 190 Canadians across 44 states). Six Americans died. There are two more Canadians. There were a total of 8 people who went to the grocery store, bought fruit, and did not return home. A quarter of the U.S. patients were children under 5 years of age. Almost half were aged 65 or older.
And just this year (2026), melons imported from Guatemala by Ayco Farms Inc. infected at least 70 people in 25 states. The CDC didn’t even warn the public while the outbreak was ongoing.
This is not bad luck. This is a pattern.
Why does this keep happening?
Here’s something the food industry doesn’t want you to think too much about. Melon is almost perfectly designed to make people sick.
The mesh shell acts like a bacterial sponge, trapping pathogens and protecting them from disinfectants. Unlike most agricultural products, bacteria don’t just stay on the surface of melons after harvest – they grow there. The fruit falls to the ground during production and absorbs whatever is in the soil or irrigation water. When vines “slip” off the vine at harvest, stem scars become open portals through which pathogens can travel directly into the pulp. And when you cut it open (transferring everything from the rough skin to a knife, cutting board, and edible portion), you’ve completed your work on contamination.
Then eat it raw. There is no cooking. There is no kill step. There is nothing between you and the bacteria.
The hospitalization rate at the time of the outbreak in 2023 was 44%. This is the same as Listeria, a pathogen that we treat like a public health emergency. Salmonella in cantaloupe melons is hospitalizing people at listeria rates and we continue to be shocked.
What I want you to understand
I have been able to sit down with grieving families and tell them that none of this is abstract. There were 33 names of people who died in 2011. We had grandchildren visiting on Sundays. They had doctors who told their families there was nothing more to do.
The company that grew, packaged, and shipped the melons knew or should have known that its facilities were unsafe. The regulatory system that was supposed to capture this had gaps that you could drive a truck through. And in some cases, it literally happened.
I’ve been saying for years that melons are a high-risk food that deserves serious and continued attention from the FDA, growers, and importers, especially those importing them from Mexico and Central America, where the worst outbreaks have been traced.
We have science. I have a history of illness. We have a body count. We don’t seem to have the political will to treat this fruit with the seriousness it demands.
Until the board decides that a sick child costs more than a clean packaging facility – and it will eventually because I will keep showing them the bills – the melon outbreak will continue.
I’ve been doing this for over 30 years. I like nothing more than to stop.
