After health officials found no trace of E. coli bacteria at the outlets of Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc., the company has said it would reopen all 43 restaurants in Seattle and Portland.
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As 43 shuttered Chipotle restaurants in Washington and OR prepared to reopen on Wednesday following an E. coli outbreak that has sickened about 49 people, health officials said they’re still unable to pinpoint the outbreak’s source.
The Oregon Health Authority (OHA) announced Monday, November 9, that public health officials had made several recommendations to Chipotle about actions to take before reopening its closed-down restaurants there.
“It just drives me nuts”, said Bill Marler, who built his national reputation with the 1993 E. coli outbreak at Seattle Jack in the Box restaurants. Majority reported eating at Chipotle locations before becoming ill. Jeff Nelken, a food safety professional, acknowledged that cross-contamination of E. coli could come from a variety of sources in the environment. Health officials said the findings are not unusual, because sometimes the contaminated foods are consumed or thrown out before samples are taken.
Reiterating that current testing methods are not a hundred percent reliable, Dr. William Schaffner, an expert at Vanderbilt University Medical Center said, “A lot of foodborne outbreaks are due to low-level contamination of product”.
Chipotle says its restaurants will be reopening in the coming days. But there was also a fourth in Seattle that put two people in the hospital.
Workers clean inside a still-closed Chipotle restaurant Monday, …
The chain faced a salmonella outbreak linked to tomatoes that sickened dozens of people in Minnesota beginning in August.
The July outbreak had ended by the time the health department investigated, and officials found no evidence of an ongoing problem that people needed to know about, said Duchin, who noted the two cases involved different E. coli strains. The incubation period for E. coli is typically three to four days after exposure, but may be as short as one day or as long as 10 days, Chipotle said, citing the CDC. So far there are no signs that Chipotle restaurants in other states are involved in the outbreak. Most complained of suffering bloody diarrhea and vomiting.
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”.
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Khalil Rouse, a manager at the Apalachee Parkway location expressed that despite the recent outbreaks Tallahassee Chipotle restaurants have not seen a decline in their sales.
