As 43 shuttered Chipotle restaurants in Washington and OR prepared to reopen on Wednesday after an E. coli outbreak that has sickened about 49 people, health officials said they’re still unable to pinpoint the outbreak’s source.
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“The fact that they hadn’t had any reported illnesses since late October suggests that that part of the illness may be over”, said Jonathan Modie with the Oregon Health Authority.
(Lindquist) “Chipotle themselves is going to be doing lot testing before they send any food out on a national level”. It is the same bacteria that was the cause of the outbreak in OR and Washington.
“I have no doubt in mind that the civil justice system does change behavior”, said Ryan Osterholm, a lawyer for Pirtzer Olsen in Minneapolis, which has sued Chipotle in the current case and in a previous case in Minnesota.
Conducting independent testing in its restaurants and distribution center in addition to testing conducted by health department and Food and Drug Administration officials, all of which showed no E. coli.
In the 10 days since closing down the 43 OR and WA restaurants, the company has done extensive cleaning and sanitizing and replaced all food ingredients with fresh items.
That gave Chipotle enough assurance to reopen the closed restaurants. One third of the cases have been hospitalized, but there have been no deaths.
But it’s impossible to avoid all bacteria on food, Cieslak says. The restaurants will be resupplied with a fresh supply of ingredients, the company said.
Most reports of potential food-related illnesses pose no ongoing threat, Duchin said, so local health departments do not report them to the public. The company says it has received results of 900 tests for E. coli on samples form restaurant equipment and surfaces and all of them were negative. Officials explained that this is not unusual because by the time the testing is done, often the source of contamination is gone, either because it has been consumed or thrown away.
“The safety of our customers and integrity of our food supply has always been our highest priority”, Chipotle chairman Steve Ells stated. Most people who are ill report eating at Chipotle restaurants before getting sick, including the location at the Kent Station shopping center. Symptoms include diarrhea, abdominal cramps, nausea and vomiting.
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He also added an apology, saying, “We are sorry to those affected by this situation, and it is our greatest priority to ensure that we go above and beyond to make certain that we find any opportunity to do better in any area of food safety”.
