My Winnipeg, Manitoba (Canada) hero, Burton Cummings, was slated to sing the National anthem for the next Winnipeg Jets home game but was involved in a serious car crash. Thankfully he survived but sadly may not be able to make it to Winnipeg to sing.
Go Jets go.
The story can be found here
There’s just not enough grad students willing to go deep and shield professors from abusive partners, bail their professors out of jail, coach girls hockey or drink E. coli for the sake of science.
Rachael Rettner of Live Science reports that in a new studdy, volunteers downed a cup of E. coli, for science.
Their fortitude paid off. Scientists were able to study an important question: whether a person’s blood type affects the severity of an “Enterotoxigenic E. coli” infection, the leading cause of traveler’s diarrhea.
It turns out, there was a difference in severity by blood type: Those with blood type A got sick sooner, and experienced more severe symptoms, than those with blood type B or O, the researchers said. [Top 7 Germs in Food that Make You Sick]
What’s more, the study uncovered an explanation for these findings: It appears that the bacteria release a protein that attaches to intestinal cells in people with blood type A, but not in people with other blood types.
The new finding might one day lead to the development of a vaccine that could reduce disease severity in people with type A blood. “A vaccine targeting this protein would potentially protect the individuals at highest risk for severe disease,” study senior author Dr. James Fleckenstein, an associate professor of medicine and molecular microbiology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, said in a statement.
The study was published online (May 17) in The Journal of Clinical Investigation.
Original article on Live Science.
The Lake Geneva teen who returned home last week after an E. coli diagnosis overseas described his experience and thanked supporters in a pair of videos Monday.
Nathan Dyer started feeling sick during a trip to Morocco and was taken to a Paris hospital where he was in a coma for a period of time. Doctors later diagnosed him with E. coli.
He returned home where he is still recovering. He’s feeling neurological and physical effects of being in a coma. Doctors in Paris said he should make a full recovery.
Oh, and E. coli doesn’t work that fast. It takes a couple of days.
Book chapter: McDonald’s is not the source of most foodborne illness. It’s a fairy tale.
On Sunday, May 21, 2000, at 1:30 p.m., the Bruce Grey Owen Sound Health Unit in Ontario, Canada, posted a notice to hospitals and physicians on their web site to make them aware of a boil water advisory and that a suspected agent in the increase of diarrheal cases was E. coli O157:H7.
There had been a marked increase in illness in the town of about 5,000 people, and many were already saying the water was suspect. But the first public announcement was also the Sunday of the Victoria Day long weekend and received scant media coverage.
It wasn’t until Monday evening that local television and radio began reporting illnesses, stating that at least 300 people in Walkerton were ill.
At 11:00 a.m., on Tuesday May 23, the Walkerton hospital jointly held a media conference with the health unit to inform the public of outbreak, make the public aware of the potential complications of the E. coli O157:H7 infection, and to tell the public to take the necessary precautions. This generated a print report in the local paper the next day, which was picked up by the national wire service Tuesday evening, and subsequently appeared in papers across Canada on May 24.
Ultimately, 2,300 people in a town of 5,000 were sickened and seven died. All the gory details and mistakes and steps for improvement were outlined in the report of the Walkerton inquiry.
Paul Hunter of the Toronto Star writes it was a glorious, sun-warmed afternoon after a long winter. Robbie Schnurr’s blinds were closed. He was finalizing his plans to die.
“Pretty much where I’m laying right now, where I’ve been for years,” he said, reflexively patting the bedsheet between him and the half-finished bottles of water kept within easy reach.
“What does a person do when they know they’re going to die within hours? I mean, do you walk over and look out the window? I can’t walk anyways. I guess you just wait for the time to pass and then you miss the hors d’oeuvres.”
It’s been 18 years since a deadly E. coli outbreak devastated the rural town of Walkerton, 150 kilometres northwest of Toronto. Seven people perished. A further 2,500, half the population, took ill. Most eventually got better. Schnurr never did.
Poisoned like the others, his health declined slowly and painfully until he lived in a sort of limbo: a prisoner in his own body, in his own bed, here in his 11th-floor Mississauga condo, a 71-year-old alone and feeling largely forgotten.
The former OPP officer and investigator with Ontario’s Office of the Fire Marshal was in constant pain from a degenerative nerve disease. Doctors, he said, told him he would continue to decline. There was no hope of improvement.
His legs had wasted away. Numbness in his fingers made it impossible for him to write or button a shirt; he opened bottles of painkillers with his mouth. He was losing sight in his right eye; the hearing in one ear was already gone. He’d leave his home only every two weeks, strapped on a gurney to be transported to the Queensway Health Centre for an intravenous immunoglobulin treatment. He went for the last time in late April.
On May 1, a doctor came to him.
In the company of his younger sister, Barbara Ribey, her husband, Norm, and two friends, Schnurr fulfilled his wish for a physician-assisted death.
“I just won’t live like this anymore,” he explained the day before that final moment. “There’s nothing to look forward to, there’s no goals in life. There’s nothing.”
Before he took ill, Schnurr said he “had the world by the ass.” He wanted people to know that. He also didn’t want forgotten what happened at Walkerton and how it cheated him, and others from his hometown, in life and left a heartbreaking legacy.
Schnurr said he also recently spoke to two old friends from the OPP who’d had no idea of what became of him.
He wanted everyone to know. So he invited the Star to his home to share his story and explain his decision.
Schnurr was, as it would have been described in another era, a man’s man, living like he was the lead in a 1970s action movie.
Mustachioed and handsome, he drove fast cars (the last a black Corvette), lived for long stretches on his 35-foot boat (where the parties were frequent) and had a closet full of Armani and Hugo Boss suits and silk ties. He owned a condo in Mexico and, befitting a Hollywood star, he always seemed to have a beautiful date on his arm.
“Women loved Robbie,” said Ribey.
Schnurr skied, he rollerbladed, he had a black belt in karate. As a teen, he played every sport he could. He excelled at hockey and was never afraid to drop the gloves. In baseball, a fastball in the low to mid-90s caught a scout’s eye, and he went off to pitch in the minors in North Carolina.
“I know I could have made the big leagues, but I didn’t know how long it would take,” he said. “And there was this girl that wanted me to get married. When I got home she handed me an application for the OPP.”
The policing job idea stuck, but the thought of marriage didn’t. Schnurr became a cadet at 19, was sworn in and got his gun at 21. He said he was shot twice and stabbed twice. He lost hearing in one ear because of target shooting practice. He investigated motorcycle gangs — “We didn’t get along real well, the bikers and I” — and major crimes.
He moved from Owen Sound to Kenora to Manaki before landing in Orillia in the early 1980s shortly before a train derailed in nearby Medonte. The fire marshal’s office was impressed with how he handled that case and suggested he apply. Schnurr said he beat out 800 other candidates for the job and was soon sent off to train with the FBI to become an expert in explosions.
In newspapers during the ’80s and ’90s, Schnurr was frequently quoted standing among the ashes at one fire or another. He figured he investigated some 2,000 fires. At one point, he helped profile and hunt down an arsonist who was terrorizing Toronto’s west end. On another case, the torching of a church, he received death threats.
Through his working life, sports remained important, as he coached youth baseball and organized instructional clinics around the province.
Though single at the end, he had married twice, had a daughter, Samantha, whom he adored and a grandson, Kaiden, born in January.
Tough as he was, through a twist of fate Schnurr was exiled from the world he embraced so enthusiastically.
“Now, I can’t even get down the goddamned hall,” he said. “To make a long story short, I was screwed.”
Schnurr didn’t even live in Walkerton when he encountered his kryptonite there. He’d gone to his hometown for his mother’s memorial in mid-May of 2000. When he returned to Mississauga, he realized he’d forgotten his suit jacket. With Victoria Day weekend coming, he decided to make a quick return trip to Walkerton to pick it up and see a couple of friends on the Friday before the holiday traffic got heavy.
“It was a really hot and muggy day and when I got there, I took a pitcher of water and chugalugged it,” he said.
That began a weekend of hell that lasted 18 years.
“I had blood coming out of both ends,” he said of the next 48 hours, spent feeling groggy and on the floor of his condo. “It was almost two days before I could get any help because I wasn’t strong enough.”
Walkerton’s water supply had been contaminated. A heavy rainstorm washed cow manure carrying a strain of E. coli O157:H7 into a vulnerable town well and, because of improper chlorination, the lethal bacteria was not destroyed.
The poison was passed on through tainted tap water and made thousands sick with severe gastrointestinal issues, including bloody diarrhea, in one of the worst public health disasters in Canadian history. A landmark, seven-year study of those who fell ill, released in 2008, determined there were legacy illnesses from the tragedy. Patients who had confirmed gastroenteritis had a 30 per cent higher risk of high blood pressure or kidney damage.
The study found that 22 children who became sick in 2000 had permanent kidney damage, but treatment had stopped that illness from getting worse.
Dr. William Clark, a kidney specialist at London Health Sciences Centre who led the study, looked again three years ago at the victims of Walkerton, and found that although “there is no doubt some people have had significant long-term problems” when compared with similar small towns, Walkerton is actually doing “somewhat better” when it comes to kidney and heart issues.
That, he suggests, could be related to a post-crisis medical screening program involving about 4,000 residents. It not only identified health issues related to the contamination, but also picked up ailments such as diabetes and hypertension, allowing physicians to get those patients on proper medication.
Clark said the kidney and heart issues of Walkerton residents have improved, but “there’s no doubt they’re on more medication” than comparable groups.
Schnurr had no idea others were also poisoned as he floundered on his condominium floor in 2000. He didn’t know why he was sick, even as an ambulance eventually took him, in blood-soaked clothes, to the hospital. He also wondered why all the medical staff took such keen interest in his Walkerton roots. Then, on one of the muted televisions at the hospital, he started to see familiar faces from his hometown.
“I’m going, ‘What’s going on?’ (A hospital worker) said to me, ‘You haven’t heard about the E. coli epidemic in Walkerton?’ Bang. It all came together.”
Schnurr returned to work until 2002, but he got progressively weaker. His retirement plan had been to take a lucrative position investigating insurance fraud in the U.S., or set up his own business. Instead, he struggled with balance, falling often, and forgot things. At 55, he could no longer work.
Schnurr said the bacterial infection destroyed his immune system and that led to his current neurological disorder. Press reports, years after the Walkerton disaster, chronicled Schnurr’s struggles as a lingering victim.
Doctors eventually diagnosed Schnurr with chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP), a neurological disorder that causes the body’s immune system to attack and destroy the myelin sheath that envelops nerves. It’s comparable to stripping the insulation off electrical wires. Symptoms include tingling in the feet and hands as well as progressive weakness in the legs and arms. For Schnurr, it also brought debilitating pain.
“Anything too hot or too cold on him would almost be like tinfoil on a tooth filling,” Ribey said.
CIDP, a rare disorder, typically follows an infection in the body that messes up the immune system. There is always a suspected trigger, but the exact cause can’t be pinned down.
Clark, the lead health investigator at Walkerton, said research hasn’t shown a good correlation between E. coli O157:H7 and CIDP.
“But I’m not excluding it because the reality is any inflammatory event may … contribute to the onset of an autoimmune disorder, which CIDP really is,” he said.
At first, Schnurr could “furniture walk” around his condo, using a cane and clutching at various items to keep his balance. But there were too many tumbles, too many sutures and too many broken bones. Five times, he ended up in the hospital. Once he fell into his television, pushing it through the drywall.
“When I could get out of bed, I’d go down into the living room and sit there and stare,” he said. “I wouldn’t even answer the phone.”`
When his legs got weaker, Schnurr would crawl around his home, sometimes till his knees bled. For the past decade, even that was too much.
“I would often hope and pray I would get some kind of something to make me well,” he said. “I know now that’s not going to happen and …”
The rest of that thought preoccupied his mind, he said, for almost 10 years. He wanted out of a life that hurt to live. Before assisted death became legal in Canada in 2016, he considered going to Switzerland, where it was available.
“I’m not afraid. I’m not scared. I’m almost looking … I am looking forward to it because I’ll be gone,” he said.
“I think most people, well, I know most people, they don’t want to die. They want to live, but life is no fun for me. I can’t go anywhere. I can’t do anything. My body is breaking down more and more. So I discussed it with doctors and family. They agreed with me. So here I am.”
Schnurr was resolute in his decision, approaching his own death with an almost clinical detachment — “There was never a tear,” Ribey said — as he wondered about timing and process. He said he cleaned up any debts and other paperwork so his sister wouldn’t be burdened. He got someone to throw away all his pills and he said goodbye to those who mattered.
“I’m rational. I’m in pain, but I’m always in pain,” he said. “I gave it a lot of thought. It’s not something you decide overnight.”
On his birthday on July 14, 2017, he posted on Facebook that it would be his last.
“Going back a month ago up till present, I was ticking the days off,” he said. “I just didn’t want to suffer anymore. The pain and suffering and lack of friends, you know. I’m basically here alone with the exception of the people that come in and clean.”
On the first day of May, in the afternoon, Ribey lay down next to her brother. It was time. A doctor administered three injections.
“I was lying beside him and holding his hand and he just put his head down on mine and said, ‘How’s my little sister?’ And that’s when I started to cry. Then I said something like, thank you for being such a kind brother and a good brother to me. I’m going to miss you … I told him I loved him.”
She said it was “very, very peaceful and very quick.”
For Schnurr, a man broken beyond repair, the pain stopped.
French food retailer Leclerc has issued a recall of a brand of cheese made with raw milk that has been linked by the authorities to cases of E.coli O26 among young children.s
Leclerc, France’s biggest supermarket chain by market share, said on its website that it was withdrawing Reblochon cheese supplied by cheesemaker Chabert in the Savoy region and sold under the “Nos regions ont du talent” (“Our regions have talent”) brand.
The move came after the French health authorities linked seven cases of E. coli O26 bacteria among children between one-and-a-half and three years to the cheese, which is a creamy speciality of the French Alps.
“The investigations conducted by the health authorities have confirmed an epidemiological link between these cases and the consumption of whole Reblochon cheese made with raw milk under the brand and sold by the Leclerc chain in several regions,” France’s health and agriculture ministries said in a joint statement.
The ministries said that six of the seven cases of infection involved hemolytic-uremic syndrome, a potentially serious condition that can cause kidney failure among young children.
Six children were taken to hospital and one is yet to return home, the health ministry added in an emailed response.
If six of the seven cases have HUS, there are dozens more that are sick.
To properly assess a food establishment for compliance with local food safety regulations is a science and an art. They take time and energy.
The science is applying risk assessment to determine the severity of the public health violation and the art is being able to effectively communicate the findings to the operator or Person-in-Charge. On-site training of the cited violations is an additional effort conducted by inspectors time permitting.
A recent study “How Scheduling Can Bias Quality Assessment: Evidence from Food Safety Inspections,” co-written by Maria Ibáñez and Mike Toffel, looks at how scheduling affects workers’ behavior and how that affects quality or productivity. In the study the authors suggest reducing the amount of given inspections during the day as fatigue will negatively affect the quality of successive inspections . As such a cap on inspections should be implemented to correct this issue. As much as I agree with this statement, the problem stems from inadequate resources to hire more staff to conduct inspections. Many inspectors are generalists meaning that on any given day they may be required to inspect a restaurant, on-site sewage system, playground, pool and deal with any environmental health issues that arise. Unfortunately, quality is sometimes sacrificed by quantity simply due to a lack of staff.
Carmen Nobel reports:
Simple tweaks to the schedules of food safety inspectors could result in hundreds of thousands of currently overlooked violations being discovered and cited across the United States every year, according to new research about how scheduling affects worker behavior.
The potential result: Americans could avoid 19 million foodborne illnesses, nearly 51,000 hospitalizations, and billions of dollars of related medical costs.
Government health officers routinely drop in to inspect restaurants, grocery stores, schools, and other food-handling establishments, checking whether they adhere to public health regulations. The rules are strict. Food businesses where serious violations are found must clean up their acts quickly or risk being shut down.
Yet each year some 48 million Americans get sick, 128,000 are hospitalized, and 3,000 die due to foodborne illnesses, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
The research is detailed in the paper “How Scheduling Can Bias Quality Assessment: Evidence from Food Safety Inspections,” co-written by Maria Ibáñez, a doctoral student in the Technology and Operations Management Unit at Harvard Business School, and Mike Toffel, the Senator John Heinz Professor of Environmental Management at HBS, experts in scheduling and in inspections, respectively.
“The more inspections you have done earlier in the day, the more tired you’re going to be and the less energy you’re going to have to discover violations”
“This study brought together Maria’s interest in how scheduling affects workers’ behavior and how that affects quality or productivity, and my interest in studying the effectiveness of inspections of global supply chainsand of factories in the US,” Toffel says.
Timing is everything
Previous research (pdf) showed that the accuracy of third-party audits is affected by factors such as the inspector’s gender and work experience. Ibáñez and Toffel wanted to look at the effect of scheduling because it’s relatively easy for organizations to fix those problems.
The researchers studied a sampling of data from Hazel Analytics, which gathers food safety inspections from local governments across the United States. The sample included information on 12,017 inspections by 86 inspectors over several years; the inspected establishments included 3,399 restaurants, grocers, and schools in Alaska, Illinois, and New Jersey. The information contained names of the inspectors and establishments inspected, date and time of the inspection, and violations recorded.
In addition to studying quantitative data, Ibáñez spent several weeks accompanying food safety inspectors on their daily rounds. This allowed her to see firsthand how seriously inspectors took their jobs, how they made decisions, and the challenges they faced in the course of their workdays. “I’m impressed with inspectors,” she says. “They are the most dedicated people in the world.”
Undetected violations
Analyzing the food safety inspection records, the researchers found significant inconsistencies. Underreporting violations causes health risks, and also unfairly provides some establishments with better inspection scores than they deserve. According to the data, inspectors found an average 2.4 violations per inspection. Thus, citing just one fewer or one more violation can lead to a 42 percent decrease or increase from the average—and great potential for unfair assessments across the food industry, where establishments are judged on their safety records by consumers and inspectors alike.
On average, inspectors cited fewer violations at each successive establishment inspected throughout the day, the researchers found. In other words, inspectors tended to find and report the most violations at the first place they inspected and the fewest violations at the last place.
The researchers chalked this up to gradual workday fatigue; it takes effort to notice and document violations and communicate (and sometimes defend) them to an establishment’s personnel.
“The more inspections you have done earlier in the day, the more tired you’re going to be and the less energy you’re going to have to discover violations,” Ibáñez says.
They also found that when conducting an inspection risked making the inspector work later than usual, the inspection was conducted more quickly and fewer violations were cited. “This seems to indicate that when inspectors work late, they are more prone to rush a bit and not be as meticulous,” Toffel says.
The level of inspector scrutiny also depended on whatever had been found at the prior inspection that day. In short, finding more violations than usual at one place seemed to induce the inspectors to exhibit more scrutiny at the subsequent place.
“This seems to indicate that when inspectors work late, they are more prone to rush a bit and not be as meticulous”
For example, say an inspector is scheduled to inspect a McDonald’s restaurant and then a Whole Foods grocer. Suppose McDonald’s had two violations the last time it was inspected. If the inspector now visits that McDonald’s and finds five or six violations, the inspector is likely to be particularly meticulous at the Whole Foods next on the schedule, reporting more violations than she otherwise would.
That behavior may be because inspectors put much effort into helping establishments learn the rules, create good habits, and improve food safety practices.
“It can be frustrating when establishments neglect these safety practices, which increases the risk of consumers getting sick,” Ibáñez says. “When inspectors discover that a place has deteriorated a lot, they’re disappointed that their message isn’t getting through, and because it poses a dangerous situation for public health.”
On the other hand, finding fewer violations than usual at one site had no apparent effect on what the inspector uncovered at the subsequent establishment. “When they find that places have improved a lot since their last inspection, they just move on without letting that affect their next inspection.”
Changes could improve public safety
The public health stakes are high for these types of errors in food safety inspections. The researchers estimate that tens of thousands of Americans could avoid food poisoning each year simply by reducing the number of establishments an inspector visits on a single day. Often, inspectors will cluster their schedule to conduct inspections on two or three days each week, saving the other days for administrative duties in the office. While this may save travel time and costs, it might be preventing inspectors from doing their jobs more effectively.
One possible remedy: Managers could impose a cap on the maximum number of inspections per day, and rearrange schedules to disperse inspections throughout the week—a maximum of one or two each day rather than three or four.
In addition, inspectors could plan early-in-the-day visits to the highest-risk facilities, such as elementary school cafeterias or assisted-living facilities, where residents are more vulnerable to the perils of foodborne illnesses than the general public.
On the plus side, tens of thousands of hospital bills are likely avoided every year, thanks to inspectors inadvertently applying more scrutiny after an unexpectedly unhygienic encounter at their previous inspection.
“Different scheduling regimes, new training, or better awareness could raise inspectors’ detection to the levels seen after they observe poor hygiene, which would reduce errors even more and result in more violations being detected, cited and corrected,” Ibáñez says.
The authors estimate that, if the daily schedule effects that erode an inspector’s scrutiny were eliminated and the establishment spillover effects that increase scrutiny were amplified by 100 percent, inspectors would detect many violations that are currently overlooked, citing 9.9 percent more violations.
“Scaled nationwide, this would result in 240,999 additional violations being cited annually, which would in turn yield 50,911 fewer foodborne illness-related hospitalizations and 19.01 million fewer foodborne illness cases per year, reducing annual foodborne illness costs by $14.20 billion to $30.91 billion,” the authors write.
Lessons for inspections
While the study focuses on food safety inspections, it offers broad lessons for any manager who has to manage or deal with inspections.
“One implication is that bias issues will arise, so take them into account as you look at the inspection reports as data,” Ibáñez says. “And another is that we should try to correct them. We should be mindful about the factors that may bias our decisions, and we should proactively change the system so that we naturally make better decisions.”
Supply chain? Blockchain? Chain gang?
In food safety, anyone is only as good as their weakest link.
The fall-out can be devastating.
Several businesses have been impacted, positively and negatively, by the current E. coli outbreak. CTV Edmonton’s Dan Grummett reports.
As the number of Alberta residents sickened by pork tainted with E. coli rises, many of the butcher shops caught up in the ensuing recall say their businesses’ reputations have been damaged.
Since the outbreak began in late March, 40 cases of E. coli infection have been confirmed; 12 people have been hospitalized and one person has died.
The outbreak began when several people who visited the same restaurant in Edmonton become ill. Alberta Health Services soon traced the illnesses to pork products distributed by The Meat Shop in Pine Haven, Alb.
Edmonton’s Real Deal Meats says her family-run business has had to throw away thousands of dollars worth of meat.
That prompted a recall that has since expanded to include raw and frozen meat, ground pork, sausages and more. The products have only been distributed in Alberta.
An Edmonton law firm has already begun a $15-million lawsuit against The Meat Shop, on behalf of those who have become ill. But more than half a dozen businesses whose names have been caught up in the recall say their reputations are taking a hit too.
Alicia Boisvert of Edmonton’s Real Deal Meats says her family-run business has had to throw away thousands of dollars worth of meat — much of it returned by customers.
“We have to remove all the packaging… before the truck picks it up,” she told CTV Edmonton. “And then we have to pay for that (removal). Obviously, we’re going to have to figure that out as well.”
Another business whose reputation has taken a hit in this outbreak is Mama Nita’s Filipino Cuisine in southeast Edmonton – the restaurant where the outbreak began.
A full 21 of the 40 lab-confirmed cases have been linked to Mama Nita’s. The restaurant is still open but would not speak to CTV Edmonton about how their business is doing.
The other 19 illnesses — including the one involving the patient who died — have been linked to pork sold by Pine Haven’s retail partners.
The names of each business have been listed on the Canadian Food Inspection Agency’s website, their store fronts splashed on the news even if they didn’t sell any contaminated pork.
Real Deal Meats’ Boisvert says, just being associated with an E. coli outbreak has led to many sleepless night for her and her family.
At K&K Foodliner — another food retailer caught up in the recall — business is slower. Even though Pine Haven pork is no longer sold at the store, general manager Kevin Krause says some customers are avoiding pork altogether.
“This is our first recall in 62 years,” he told CTV Edmonton. “Regardless if it’s Pine Haven’s fault, it’s still our reputation on the line as well.”
Don and Ben talk about human pathogens in produce and trying to define baseline for prevalence (which is complicated, and it depends). The conversation then goes to a discussion on Don’s appearance on Do By Friday and where podcasts fit into extension and outreach. The show ends on some listener feedback and the guys trying to figure out the history of consumer-focused storage time/temperature guidance.
Man in the bathroom checking internet with iPhone 5s smartphone, always connected.
Episode 153 is available on iTunes and here.
Show notes so you can follow along at home:
A notice issued on the Food Safety Authority of Ireland’s website read: “Following detection of shiga toxin-producing Eschericia coli O26 in a raw milk cheese, the above batch of Camembert de Normandie cheese is being recalled by La Fromagerie du Plessis.
“A point-of-sale recall notice is displayed in Avoca stores which sold the affected batch advising customers not to eat this batch.”
The affected product is the Camembert de Normandie au lait cru, 250g with approval number FR 14 608 001 CE.
The batch code is 260218DS0 with a use-by date of May 2, 2018.
Jaccii Farris of 69 News reports a community rallies around a Bucks County family who is dealing with a heartbreaking loss.
They say their preschool-aged daughter died because of the E. coli bacteria.
Someone close to the Robert family started a YouCaring page to help with medical expenses after three members of the family were stricken by the bacteria back in April.
The pictures of the family of four posted on the site are from a happier time.
Now, members of the community are coming to their side at their darkest hour.
According to the website, on April 15th the Robert’s son Tyler was hospitalized at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia with a strain of E. coli that impacts the kidneys.
But soon after he was admitted, his mother and sister Hailey became ill.
Hailey was also admitted to CHOP.
Over the next two weeks, the family posted daily updates. Tyler was doing better, but Hailey was struggling.
May 2 came the hardest post a mother could make. Hailey lost her battle against the bacteria.
The Pennsylvania Department of Health confirms that an E. coli death occurred at CHOP, but would not name the victim due to HIPAA.
Officials say the death is not related to the recent E. coli cases associated with lettuce from the Yuma, Arizona region.
Bucks County family loses daughter to E. coli