Trump admin shelves Cyclospora research despite record-breaking outbreak

特朗普政府搁置环孢子虫研究，尽管疫情创下历史新高

The Trump administration is halting vital federal research on the foodborne parasite Cyclospora, despite the record-breaking, nationwide outbreak of the diarrheal pathogen, according to Politico. Of the three research programs that represent nearly all of the Cyclospora work at the US Department of Agriculture, two have been defunded, and the third is about to lose every scientist working on it.

据《政客》（Politico）报道，尽管导致腹泻的病原体环孢子虫（Cyclospora）正在全美范围内引发创纪录的疫情，但特朗普政府仍决定停止对其进行至关重要的联邦研究。在美国农业部（USDA）几乎涵盖了所有环孢子虫研究的三大项目中，有两个已被削减经费，第三个项目也即将失去所有在职科学家。

The Trump administration is shuttering the USDA’s Beltsville Agricultural Research Center near Washington, DC, and moving its work to a location in Iowa. That includes relocating the remaining Cyclospora research. Although the research is still funded, insiders told Politico that not one of the scientists working on the project plans to relocate from Maryland to Iowa. Instead, they are either retiring, being reassigned to a different project, or leaving the USDA’s research services. “They will have no parasitologists,” one USDA employee told Politico. “There will be a big knowledge gap.”

特朗普政府正在关闭位于华盛顿特区附近的美国农业部贝尔茨维尔农业研究中心，并将相关工作转移至艾奥瓦州。这其中包括搬迁剩余的环孢子虫研究项目。尽管该研究仍有资金支持，但知情人士告诉《政客》，没有一位参与该项目的科学家计划从马里兰州搬迁到艾奥瓦州。相反，他们要么选择退休，要么被重新分配到其他项目，要么直接离开美国农业部的研究部门。“他们将不再有寄生虫学家，”一位美国农业部员工告诉《政客》，“这将造成巨大的知识断层。”

The US is experiencing the largest Cyclospora outbreak ever recorded. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has tallied nearly 30,000 confirmed and probable cases this summer. At least 922 people have been hospitalized with cyclosporiasis, and two have died. Since 2018, the US has generally reported between 2,000 and 5,000 cases, though the US reported 1,180 cases in 2025.

美国目前正经历有记录以来规模最大的环孢子虫疫情。美国疾病控制与预防中心（CDC）统计显示，今年夏天已出现近3万例确诊和疑似病例。至少有922人因环孢子虫病住院治疗，其中2人死亡。自2018年以来，美国每年的报告病例数通常在2,000至5,000例之间，而2025年报告的病例数为1,180例。

Lost research opportunities

错失的研究机会

Cyclospora is difficult to work with in a laboratory compared to other foodborne pathogens, such as E. coli or Salmonella. Cyclospora grow and reproduce only in the human gut, not in lab conditions. Although the parasite can be isolated from feces in labs, it can sometimes be difficult to fish out; it can be shed intermittently or at low levels, requiring repeat fecal samples from an infected person.

与其他食源性病原体（如大肠杆菌或沙门氏菌）相比，环孢子虫在实验室中难以处理。环孢子虫仅在人体肠道内生长和繁殖，无法在实验室条件下培养。虽然实验室可以从粪便中分离出这种寄生虫，但有时很难提取；它可能呈间歇性或低水平排出，需要从感染者身上多次采集粪便样本。

The parasite is also harder to study using genetic techniques. It has a much larger genome than bacteria, making genomic sequencing costlier and more laborious. It also reproduces sexually, meaning each generation will have new mixes of genes, making it harder to trace back lineages of the parasite to a single contaminated food. That’s in contrast to bacteria, which reproduce asexually, creating clones that are often nearly identical and easy to trace.

这种寄生虫也更难通过基因技术进行研究。它的基因组比细菌大得多，这使得基因组测序成本更高、工作量更大。此外，它通过有性繁殖，意味着每一代都会产生新的基因组合，这使得追踪寄生虫的谱系以溯源至单一受污染食物变得更加困难。这与通过无性繁殖产生几乎完全相同且易于追踪的克隆体的细菌形成了鲜明对比。

With this year’s outbreak, researchers hoped for a surge in understanding of the parasite. “We see this as an enormous opportunity, this current outbreak, to have really a lot of samples that could help us understand these outbreaks better,” another USDA employee told Politico. However, people who worked on the defunded Cyclospora programs are barred from doing any more research and are simply preserving samples they already had from previous samples.

面对今年的疫情，研究人员曾希望对这种寄生虫的了解能有大幅提升。另一位美国农业部员工告诉《政客》：“我们认为当前的疫情是一个巨大的机会，可以获得大量样本，帮助我们更好地了解这些疫情。”然而，那些在被削减经费的环孢子虫项目中工作的人员已被禁止进行任何进一步的研究，只能简单地保存他们之前收集的样本。

While funding may be restored at a later time, experts said the disruption to the research will be difficult to overcome. “The bigger impact is that there are very few people in the world that study these [parasites],” Joelle Mosso, associate vice president for science growers at the Western Growers Association, a trade group representing produce farmers, told Politico. “It’s not just replacing the lab. It takes decades to build expertise.”

虽然未来可能会恢复资金，但专家表示，研究中断带来的影响将难以克服。代表农产品种植者的贸易组织“西部种植者协会”（Western Growers Association）科学副总裁乔尔·莫索（Joelle Mosso）告诉《政客》：“更大的影响在于，世界上研究这些（寄生虫）的人非常少。这不仅仅是更换实验室的问题，培养专业知识需要几十年的时间。”