The Trump administration’s anti-regulatory approach and cost-cutting moves risk unraveling a critical system of checks and balances that helps ensure the safety of the U.S. food supply, industry experts told KFF Health News.

An E. coli outbreak that occurred late last year — for which the investigation was concluded in February — signals how, with the FDA changes, more people could get sick with foodborne illnesses as companies and growers face less regulatory oversight and fewer consequences for selling tainted food products, according to interviews with consumer advocates, researchers, and former employees at the FDA and U.S. Department of Agriculture.

In addition, the administration withdrew a proposed regulation to reduce the presence of salmonella in raw poultry, a plan that could h

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