Forty-eight Utahns have contracted cyclosporiasis since May 1, and vendors at Draper's Tuesday evening farmers market say the outbreak is pushing more shoppers toward locally grown food.

Russell Hatfield, who has farmed for 22 years at Hatfield's Farm, sells sweet corn, watermelons and onions at the market in Smith Fields Park. He told Fox 13 on Tuesday, Aug. 4, that he checks his irrigation water regularly and isn't worried about contamination from his operation.

"Growing local and having it directly fresh out of the ground here, we're not shipping it so it has less — it has no contaminants," Hatfield said.

Phillip Taylor, vice president of operations at Crofter Market, a Utah-based farm-to-door delivery company serving Salt Lake and Utah counties, said his own family now buys berries exclusively from local farms to avoid the risk. Crofter sources eggs, meat and microgreens from Utah farms and delivers next day to customers' doorsteps.

Food-safety experts offer a qualified endorsement of that instinct. Kalmia Kniel, a professor of microbial food safety at the University of Delaware, told TIME on July 29 that buying directly from the farmer who grew the produce is "lower risk," though she cautioned that safety ultimately depends on how food is grown, harvested, transported and stored, not simply where it's sold.

The outbreak by the numbers

The Utah Department of Health and Human Services reported Aug. 4 that of the state's 48 cases, 31 involved people who traveled outside the U.S., 12 traveled to other states and five had not left Utah. Those five cases remain under investigation.

Utah has not received any of the recalled products, and the CDC's nine-state outbreak investigation does not include the state.

Nationally, the CDC has tallied more than 18,000 cases since May 1, including two deaths in Michigan. The FDA and CDC traced the outbreak to shredded iceberg lettuce from Taylor Farms de Mexico, of Guanajuato, Mexico, served at Taco Bell locations. Taylor Farms de Mexico recalled all iceberg lettuces sourced from central Mexico on July 17.

What shoppers are doing

Stephanie Kern, a shopper at the Draper market, said she avoids vegetables at restaurants and focuses on washing everything at home. She said she feels more comfortable buying from a local farmer than a supermarket.

Utah health officials recommend buying whole heads of lettuce rather than pre-washed bagged varieties, discarding the outer two to three layers of leaves, washing inner leaves under running water and cooking greens to at least 158°F. The parasite that causes cyclosporiasis, Cyclospora cayetanensis, is resistant to routine chemical disinfection.

When and where

The Draper Farmers Market and Food Truck Night runs every Tuesday from 5 to 9 p.m. through October at Smith Fields Park, 200 E 13400 S. The market, managed by Sunset Farmers Markets, accepts SNAP/EBT and offers a Double Up Food Bucks program that gives shoppers $2 in produce tokens for every $1 spent.