Fat Duck illness traced to shellfish

Published on Thursday 10 September 2009 22:11

AN OUTBREAK of norovirus which struck down more than 500 diners at Heston Blumenthal's award-winning Fat Duck restaurant was caused in part by raw shellfish which may have been contaminated with human sewage, an official report said yesterday.

The "culinary alchemist" temporarily shut the three Michelin star restaurant in February for more than two weeks after about 40 diners complained they had fallen ill.

A total of 529 customers fell ill with vomiting and diarrhoea.

The investigation by the Health Protection Agency (HPA) found norovirus brought into the restaurant by contaminated shellfish was partly to blame for the scale of the outbreak.

Investigators concluded that this, combined with the use of unsuitable cleaning products, made the outbreak worse. It also found some staff had returned to work too early after contracting the bug.

The report into the restaurant, in Bray, Berkshire, said: "There was a large outbreak of food poisoning among diners at the Fat Duck restaurant in January and February, with over 500 reporting illness, which represents more than 15 per cent of those dining at the restaurant over this period.

"The organism responsible was norovirus.

"The norovirus was probably introduced via shellfish, because diners who ate shellfish dishes were more likely to report illness; oysters were served raw; razor clams may not have been appropriately handled or cooked; tracing of the shellfish to source showed evidence for contamination; and outbreaks of illness in other establishments have been associated with oysters from the same source."

Health inspectors traced the oysters to a supplier in Essex, which was potentially linked to other norovirus outbreaks.

The oyster beds were found to have been infected and a likely cause, the HPA report said, was human sewage.

The outbreak continued for at least six weeks because of "ongoing transmission" at the restaurant, which occurred either through "continuous contamination" of food or "person-to-person", the report found.

The combination of these factors resulted in "one of the largest outbreaks of norovirus associated with a restaurant reported in medical literature", the report's authors concluded.

The Fat Duck was allowed to reopen in March. It has since resumed its place as a favourite and has held on to the top spot in the latest edition of The Good Food Guide.

Responding to the report, a Fat Duck spokesman said: "We are glad the report has finally been published and draws a conclusion to the closure of the Fat Duck, and more importantly that the norovirus has been identified as the cause and not due to any lapse in our strict food preparation processes."