Homemade Bear Jerky Sickened Six People and Sent One to the Hospital

A Snack With a Dangerous Secret

It looked like ordinary jerky. But the homemade strips of dried bear meat that circulated among a small group of people in western North Carolina in November 2024 were harboring something invisible and dangerous: parasitic roundworms known as Trichinella. The incident resulted in three confirmed or probable cases of trichinellosis, with six people total having consumed the implicated meat — a 50% attack rate. The case, published on June 24 in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, serves as a stark reminder that wild game meat demands far more careful handling than most hunters and home cooks realize.

The outbreak was first detected in November 2024 by a clinician who treated the hospitalized patient and then notified health officials. The Graham County Health Department and North Carolina Division of Public Health subsequently launched an investigation. By the time officials began probing, no jerky was left, but four remaining pieces of frozen bear meat were sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for testing — all of which came back positive for Trichinella larvae. It's likely the jerky preparation, which involved only a marinade and drying, did not heat the meat sufficiently to kill the worms nestled inside.

What the Worms Can Do to the Human Body

The hospitalized patient developed severe symptoms, including muscle weakness, swelling around the eyes, and eosinophilia — a high level of eosinophils, a type of white blood cell. That patient eventually tested positive for antibodies to the infection, but the other two cases declined testing because they lacked health insurance and balked at the out-of-pocket costs, which ran roughly $200. All three were given a standard deworming medication and made a full recovery.

People become infected with Trichinella by consuming raw or undercooked meat containing encysted larvae. Digestion releases the larvae from the meat, which then penetrate the intestinal lining and mature into adult worms. Those adult worms produce new larvae that migrate via the bloodstream to skeletal muscle throughout the body. In severe cases, the infection can cause heart and brain inflammation — and in rare instances, death.

Why Bear Meat Is Especially Risky

Molecular testing on the leftover meat from this case identified Trichinella spiralis — a finding that carries particular significance. Researchers noted that this outbreak provides evidence of changing trichinellosis patterns. Historically, T. spiralis was the species associated with commercial pork, not wild bears. Its presence in a North Carolina black bear raises questions about how the parasite's distribution may be shifting — and whether wildlife surveys, last conducted in the state in 1998, are overdue for an update.

Trichinellosis used to be commonly caused by undercooked pork but is now very rare in the U.S. due to better food safety standards. Most cases these days are instead tied to infected game meat, including bears, with the CDC reporting only about 15 cases on average annually. That low number can create a false sense of security among hunters who process their own kills. Wildlife veterinarians advise that people should always assume bear meat is infected. "It must be cooked, 100 percent of the time," one expert has said. "You can't see the larvae — they're microscopic."

The Simple Fix That Could Prevent the Next Outbreak

Curing, salting, drying, smoking, or microwaving meat alone does not consistently kill Trichinella larvae. That means traditional jerky-making methods — even ones that have been used for generations — offer no real protection against this parasite. Officials say game meat should always be cooked to an internal temperature above 165 degrees Fahrenheit (74 degrees Celsius) to ensure all larvae are killed off. Freezing meat prior to making jerky might help as well, though some Trichinella species are known to be freeze-resistant.

The authors of the Emerging Infectious Diseases report were direct about what needs to happen next: "Low-cost safety measures and prevention efforts regarding safe wild game preparation are needed to avoid future outbreaks." As bear hunting remains a popular tradition in many parts of the U.S., the gap between how hunters have always prepared their meat and how they safely should is a public health problem hiding in plain sight — one that a meat thermometer could largely solve.