Roughly five years ago, while serving as Deputy Commissioner for Food Policy and Response at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), I sat down with NBC News for an interview on the effectiveness of the federal government's ability to respond to and prevent foodborne outbreaks.

When the piece aired, it included the tragic details of a three-year-old child who, in 2018, suffered permanent brain damage and can no longer talk, walk, or see after sharing a salad with his father that was contaminated with Escherichia coli O157:H7 during a family vacation. During this outbreak, FDA was unable to trace back to source where the contaminated leafy greens originated from and, as a result, issued an advisory for consumers nationwide to avoid all romaine lettuce, regardless of where it was grown or produced.