Researchers said if a scorecard for the nation's fight against food contamination is considered then it would show mixed results. Though headway is being made against some common foes, others are still on the increase.

A report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that in 2014, infections in the United States from E. Coli and some types of salmonella bacteria were down but some other types of salmonella as well as some lesser-seen pathogens were on the rise.

Dr. Patricia Griffin of the CDC's division of food-borne diseases said the picture was mixed, but most of it was not good news.

The CDC said despite making progress against certain types of pathogens that were reported infections from E. Coli and one common strain of salmonella were down in 2014 by about a third from 2006-2008 levels. Little improvement has been seen in curbing overall rates of salmonella and campylobacter, the two infectious contaminants that cause the highest number of illnesses in people.

It said that another pathogen, vibrio, commonly linked to seafood, was also on the rise.

According to the CDC's FoodNet tracking operation, last year there were around 19,000 infections, some 4,400 hospitalizations and 71 deaths linked to foodborne illnesses. Griffin said that clearly there is a need to do more work.

She noted that the reported numbers didn’t represent the extent of the danger accurately, since the FoodNet system only covered around 15%. She tracked nine known pathogens in just 10 US states.

While talking of the estimated full numbers beyond what FoodNet can track, she said, “We estimate that each year, one in six people in the United States gets sick from eating contaminated food”.

In total around 48 million Americans become ill from consuming food, out of which 128,000 required hospitalizations.

Food-borne diseases prove fatal for 3,000 people every year, which is above what the limited FoodNet figures have suggested.