The United States is stepping up inspection of poultry farms to keep eggs free of salmonella.

Despite laws that require inspection of egg farms once every three years by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, many egg producers still fail to conform to safety standards.

More rigorous were implemented a year ago. The FDA announced that it would visit at least 600 facilities by January 2012. But only 35 farms were inspected during the first quarter of 2011 due to lack of inspectors.

Egg farmers' profit margins are relatively small,, and with lenient rules, some producers fail to allot funds for sanitation. It was estimated that the top 175 firms, which comprise 95 percent of the industry, would need to spend approximately $20 million to comply with sanitation controls.

Nevertheless, this will cost less than the cost of contamination and hospitalization. Michael Batz of the University of Florida's Emerging Pathogens Institute estimates the cost of salmonella-contaminated infection to be at $370 million each year for individuals and the federal government.

The reason for this move is to protect consumers from contamination especially, after an incident last year wherein two big producers in Iowa recalled some 500 million salmonella-tainted eggs. Almost 2,000 Americans were affected by that contamination.

Wright County Egg, the larger of the two Iowa producers involved in the 2010 recall, produces 1.4 billion eggs annually. It was closed for four months and faces many lawsuits over the contamination.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention first traced salmonella to eggs in the mid-1980s.

Salmonellosis is an infection that causes diarrhea, stomach cramps and fever.