Billy Goat Dairy – most unappealing name for a place to buy milk – has an additional eight cases of E. coli O157:H7 and campylobacter linked to 
its raw goats milk, bringing the number of confirmed sick people to 24.
Two children were hospitalized in connection with the outbreak. One has been released; the other remains under observation, but health officials reported his condition is improving.
Nine people have been sickened with E. coli after two outbreaks in Dumfries and Galloway, including a six-year-old child who had to be taken .jpg)
into hospital after suffering complications before being discharged last night.
Health experts say the source of the infection is contact with cattle and sheep and do not believe food was involved.
The source of last month’s outbreak of an intestinal parasite at a charity food event in Sarnia (Ontario, Canada) remains a mystery.
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Public health officials questioned 286 of the more than 300 people who attended the Chef’s Challenge and found 206 became ill, said Andrew Taylor, Lambton County’s general manager of public health services.
Taylor said they also spoke with the event’s caterers and tested food samples.
“We were awaiting lab results until the end of last week and we were hoping that would be the home run,” he said, adding the results weren’t conclusive.
“The perfect investigation is where there’s illness, you identify the parasite at the source of the illness and then you link it to the food,” he said. “We have everything except the link to the food.”
Cyclospora is usually found in imported produce and contaminated irrigation water is often to blame, Taylor said.
A barfblog.com reader previously noted cyclospora is more of an environmental contamination issue than a hygiene issue. If the suspect food was something like raspberries, they are difficult to wash; basil or lettuces may be easier to wash but have a very large surface area and cyclospora is very very sticky. As with many other fresh produce outbreaks prevention on the farm is the best way to reduce risk.
A report in the U.K. Times says that celebrity chef Heston Blumenthal was just 19 years old when the way he thought about food was changed for ever. Food writer Harold McGee 
had just published a book at a time when people thought that science had very little to do with cooking, setting Blumenthal on what was to become his mission in life – using science to create his now famous culinary masterpieces.
A little more science may have informed chef that poop happens to oyster beds, it’s a good thing to check out suppliers, and people who are sick shouldn’t be serving food – that’s how to make over 500 people sick, like your restaurant did in 2009.
As of 11:00 PM EDT on June 2, 2010, a total of 35 individuals infected with a matching strain of Salmonella Newport have been reported from 11 states since March 1, 2010. (1).jpg)
The number of ill people identified in each state with this strain is as follows: AZ (2), CA (17), CO (1), ID (5), IL (1), MO (1), NM (1), NV (2), OR (2), PA (1), and WI (2). Among those for whom information is available about when symptoms started, illnesses began between March 1, 2010 and May 16, 2010. Case-patients range in age from <1 to 75 years old, and the median age is 36 years. Sixty-six percent of patients are female. Among the 30 patients with available hospitalization information, 7 (23%) were hospitalized. No deaths have been reported.
On May 21, 2010, J.H. Caldwell and Sons Inc. of Maywood, CA, recalled several brands of alfalfa sprouts distributed to wholesale distributors, restaurants, delicatessens, and grocery stores.
Recalled products might still be in grocery stores, restaurants, and consumers’ homes. Recalled products should not be consumed. Consumers are advised to review FDA’s recall site for a list of recalled products.
Children, the elderly, pregnant women, and persons with weakened immune systems should avoid eating raw sprouts of any kind (including alfalfa, clover, radish, and mung bean sprouts).
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Cook sprouts thoroughly to reduce the risk of illness. Cooking kills the harmful bacteria.
Request that raw sprouts not be added to your food. If you purchase a sandwich or salad at a restaurant or delicatessen, check to make sure that raw sprouts have not been added.
Our man in France, Albert Amgar passed along this report of an on-going outbreak of Salmonella; translated by Amy Hubbell.
The institute for sanitary surveillance is now investigating an outbreak of salmonellosis from Salmonella 4,12 :i :-, in collaboration with the concerned partners: the National Center for Salmonella Reference, The Laboratory for studies and research on food quality and processing from the French Food Safety Agency (AFSSA), the General Management of Health, and the General Management of Food. As of May 28, 2010, 88 cases of salmonellosis tied to this outbreak have been identified, of which 46 women and 42 men, aged from 1 to 89 years old (median age 8 years old). These cases are from 49 departments in France (Figure 1, below, left).
Forty-four cases have been investigated to date. Among these, 18 people have been hospitalized and have since returned home.
For the investigated cases, the symptoms appeared between March 15 and May 9, 2010.
The questioning of patients about the food they consumed during the 7 days preceding their illness showed a high frequency of consumption of dry sausage bought from the same brand.
A traceback showed that these sausages came from the same batch produced in a single firm in France, distributed nationally during the first two weeks of March 2010. The best by date for this batch extends from June 1 to 15, 2010.
The identified batch of dried sausage was recalled (consumer information was posted and communicated in a press release) by the producer on May 27, 2010.
Translator’s Note: A subsequent news search reveals that the recall is for the Lou Mountagnard brand of dried sausages. (France 24, May 28, 2010).
Don’t fire the messenger. Improve and enforce the message.
A Country Springs Hotel line cook claims he was wrongly terminated for “sanitation reasons” after dozens of people were sickened at a banquet at the Waukesha, Wis., hotel last week, adding,
"I’m the fall guy. I’m the scapegoat. There’s been no proof that I was responsible for bringing a virus to work."
The cook told WTMJ he was getting over the flu and wasn’t feeling 100 per cent the day he helped prepare the food for the banquet but he doesn’t think he should have lost his job.
"The managers, they knew I was ill, they knew there were other people that were ill. They didn’t send me home Sunday and Monday. They sent me home Tuesday. Sunday and Monday they needed me really bad. Tuesday it was not a busy day.”
The Wisconsin Food Code says kitchen employees must report if they have flu like 
symptoms. The Country Springs manager told Today’s TMJ4 that’s why they "fired one employee for failure to comply with the reporting requirement policies."
Haaarrvard, are you listening? Letting sick workers serve food is a recipe for barf.
Waukesha County health officials confirmed Monday that norovirus is behind the outbreak of gastrointestinal illness reported by many of the 500 people attending a fund-raising luncheon last week at the Country Springs Hotel.
Julianne Klimetz, a county spokeswoman, said initial lab results confirmed the cause. In addition, investigators have confirmed that two people handling the food were ill at the time.
Klimetz said the Country Springs kitchen has been cleaned and kitchen staff have been informed about proper hand washing.
Everyone’s a comedian. Did anyone tell the staff not to work if they are barfing? Or would staff get fired for not showing up, even though the no-work-when-barfing thing is written in a manual somewhere.
When did the Harvard Crimson turn into the Harvard Lampoon (which begat National Lampoon in 1970)? In all seriousness, this is some funny stuff.
The venerable Harvard newspaper, the Crimson, reports that “after closing for more than a month due to a norovirus outbreak that sickened over 300 people, the Harvard Faculty Club will reopen for private events on Monday.
“The Club, which had been undergoing inspections for food safety, reopened for overnight guests on May 6. The restaurant portion of the Club will officially reopen in early June.”
Sure all the food has been thrown out and every surface scrubbed, but nothing was said about allegations that first aired Saturday that up to 14 staffers worked while sick – a food service no-no (at least on paper).
Samuel D. Stuntz ’10—who plans to hold his wedding reception at the Faculty Club at the end of May—said that he and his fiancee, Elizabeth A. Cook ’10, are not concerned about the virus outbreak, adding,
“The fact that they were closed for so long shows that they were obviously really devoted to not doing anything unless it was absolutely safe. It’s a really popular place so that obviously means we assumed they were working really hard to get it fixed. I’m not worried about it at all,"
Rooms at the Club during Commencement week start at $429 per night for a three-night minimum.
Is the norovirus extra?
Manhattan (Kansas) is all abustle this morning as parents stream in from around the state and elsewhere to watch their children graduate after four years of college. It’s .jpg)
Commencement Day.
Over at Harrr–vard University, not only do they have to deal with one of the most embarrassing collapses in hockey history as the Boston Bruins were eliminated by the Philadelphia Flyers last night, the restaurant at the venerable Harvard Faculty Club, shuttered for weeks because of a norovirus outbreak that sickened more than 300 people, will remain closed through commencement, the height of the university’s social calendar.
On Friday, the Cambridge Health Department said an investigation found that before the club closed for the first time, 14 employees were working while they were sick and an undetermined number of employees were working less than 72 hours after they had become free of norovirus symptoms.
Louise Rice , director of public nursing for Cambridge, told the Boston Globe that state law requires that restaurant employees who become sick can not return to work until their symptoms have been gone for 72 hours.
I guess Harrr—vard has its own rules. And it must be hard to find good help for Harrr—vard, which may explain why they are advertizing for a Environmental Health Safety Officer to provide routine HACCP-based and food-code compliance inspections at university dining facilities (thank-you, barfblog reader).
Rice further said the city’s investigation found that approximately 308 people became sick at the club, and 33 of them were employees—which is about 40 percent of the club’s staff, adding,
“Having so many sick employees probably drove the contamination of the space.”
One of those sickened was 80-year-old Robert Cogan, a professor at the New England Conservatory in Boston.
After an ill-fated Easter brunch put him in the hospital for almost a month, he finally returned home last week. The gastrointestinal ailment led to a string of complications that put Cogan in intensive care for four days and extended stays at Massachusetts General Hospital and Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital.
Cogan said he’s “very disappointed” that before he ate his Easter brunch on April 4 no one at the club informed him that the restaurant had just reopened after a norovirus outbreak.
“If we’d known that, we certainly wouldn’t have gone,” said Cogan, who said he used to frequent the club for brunch.