51 sick in salmonella outbreak
A food poisoning outbreak, that sickened 51 people and was potentially linked to cooked ham supplied to small independent butchers, swept across England and Wales in September.
Food safety authorities were left racing to trace the source of the outbreak since it began in August.
30 of the cases were caused by salmonella typhimurium and were recorded in England, with clusters around the Thames Valley, Leeds, Cumbria and Stafford areas. The remainder were in Conwy and Gwynedd in Wales.
Patients included a seven month old baby and an 87 year-old pensioner and nine of the sick had to receive hospital treatment.
Dr Judy Hart, consultant in communicable disease control for Public Health Wales, said it was “highly unlikely” that the cases were a coincidence and that was a “very unusual strain of salmonella”.