It's just the frequency illusion at work. According to the CDC database [1], there have been 99 listeria outbreaks in the US between 2009 and 2021 with as many

It's just the frequency illusion at work. According to the CDC database [1], there have been 99 listeria outbreaks in the US between 2009 and 2021 with as many as 16 outbreaks in a single year (2014). These listeria outbreaks aren't as common as E coli outbreaks with over 1,000 in the same time period, but they happen all the time. (I'm using US data because I'm familiar with the CDC tool, but I'm assuming they're relatively common in Canada too since listeria is a cosmopolitan species) [1] https://wwwn.cdc.gov/norsdashboard/ https://wwwn.cdc.gov/norsdashboard/ (add Listeria to etiology to see the stats)