I don’t eat sushi. I have and it tastes like barf.

Word from JoNel Aleccia of msnbc that health tyes are investigating a growing outbreak of salmonella food poisoning possibly tied to restaurant sushi that has sickened at least 90 people in 19 states and the District of Columbia.

The outbreak of Salmonella Bareilly that has sent seven people to the hospital is mostly clustered on the eastern seaboard and the Gulf Coast, although cases have been reported as far west as Missouri and Texas, said Curtis Allen, a spokesman for the Food and Drug Administration. No deaths have been reported.

The FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are investigating the outbreak, which appears to be ongoing and expanding rapidly, according to an internal FDA email. There may be a lag of more than a month from the time people ate tainted food to the time they reported it.

Allen said the outbreak appears to be tied to seafood, and possibly sushi, but it’s still far too early to identify the actual cause.

The email identified spicy tuna roll sushi as “highly suspect,” but Allen emphasized that that is a preliminary speculation that may be proved wrong later.

The federal agencies are focusing on six restaurant clusters in Texas, Wisconsin, Maryland and Connecticut, according to the email, which was distributed outside the agency.

Salmonella Bareilly is a strain sometimes associated with bean sprouts.

Before personal hockey idol and goaltending great, Tony Espositio, there was Glenn Hall backstopping the Chicago Blackhawks for a bit.

Being a goaltender in hockey is just weird, and attracts psychologically, uh, different people.

Hall was famous for vomiting before every game.

Someone started barfing during a Detroit-area high-school hockey game Sunday night, and others soon followed: at least 30 others. Up to 80 people are believed to have been sickened.

Norovirus is suspected in the outbreak.

Some were taken for treatment by ambulance and others were taken by private vehicles to area hospitals. The city-owned complex was shut down so air and water tests could be performed.

Carol Austerberry of the Wayne County Health Department said yesterday afternoon that about 80 reports have come in of people suffering gastrointestinal problems that include diarrhea, vomiting and stomach cramping. The number might grow as reports continue to come in.

County workers are contacting health care officials to collect stool samples for the investigation, to be sent to a state lab for testing. Surveys also will be sent to the people who attended the hockey tournament.

Fire Chief Robert Tompos said water samples were shipped to an independent lab in Monroe for testing and came back clean, ruling out contamination.

Tompos said people got sick simultaneously, causing several players to vomit on benches and in locker rooms.

Tompos said some hockey players share equipment and water bottles, which could be considered mini-petri dishes.

Austerberry said good prevention starts with parents.

“If your child is sick, don’t let them go to school,” she said. “Don’t let them participate in sports where they are around a lot of people.”

Ben had a dream.

“I was at a Chick-Fil-A by myself, sat down at a table next to a family (bunch of boys, mom and dad). One of the kids, probably a 6-year-old, threw up on my back and it splattered all over the floor, table and seats.

“Staff came out to clean it up – but I didn't leave to go clean myself up, I just stood there watching, taking pictures with my phone and asking them what kind of sanitizer they were using, whether it was a different concentration that what they would normally use, and how far from the puke they were going to clean and sanitize.”

I won’t get into the Freudian or Jungian or Bromancian aspects of Ben sharing his dream with me via e-mail (and Amy and Schaffner); it’s how we roll. But Ben’s dream is grounded in the reality of stories we see daily, where people barf and a bunch of others get sick with norovirus.

Researchers from the Netherlands and Germany report in the current Eurosurveillance about a norovirus outbreak triggered by copper intoxication on a coach trip from the Netherlands to Germany.

From the abstract:

Overall, 30 of 40 people (including drivers and crew) developed nausea, vomiting and/or diarrhoea, 11 of them on the first day of the trip. The incidence epidemic curve showed a first peak on Day 1 and a second on Day 4. Nine passengers were hospitalised with gastrointestinal symptoms. Norovirus was found in stool samples from two patients, but the infection could not explain the first peak in the epidemic curve only a few hours after departure. Interviews with the passengers and an inspection of the coach and its water supply implicated the water used for coffee and tea as the potential source.

Microbiological investigations of the water were negative, but chemical analysis showed a toxic concentration of copper. Blood copper levels as well as renal and liver function were determined in 28 of the 32 passengers who had been exposed to the water. One passenger who did not have gastrointestinal symptoms had an elevated copper level of 25.9 µmol/L, without loss of liver or renal function. It is likely that the spread of norovirus was enhanced because of vomiting of one of the passengers due to copper intoxication.

The complete paper is available at http://www.eurosurveillance.org/ViewArticle.aspx?ArticleId=20104.

In response to Ben’s e-mail this morning, I asked if he could get paid to do anything else, and that maybe he needs a change.

He replied, “Don't want to change a thing. In related news, I don't really have any other skills.”

Last week, some 300 staff and students in San Francisco were sickened with norovirus believed to have been transmitted by someone barfing on a door handle.

It now appears a similar mode of transmission sickened 229 cheerleaders and cheeries at a Washington state competition.

JoNel Aleccia of msnbc cites Suzanne Pate, spokeswoman for the Snohomish Health District, as confirming Friday that norovirus was the cause, and the outbreak was likely precipitated by people who were ill in public.

"Somebody arrived at the event sick," said Pate, noting that janitorial crews were called to clean up vomit in a restroom and on an adjacent walkway. Those areas were likely exposure sites for the cheer and dance teams, she said.

Some 229 people were sickened and least 33 people sought medical attention for their illnesses, state health officials said late Friday. That number is expected to grow as the investigation continues.

A Comcast Arena spokeswoman said officials had sanitized the premises in accordance with federal health guidelines before a new event scheduled for Friday night. Tests of the arena's water supply showed no problems, Pate said.

"It's probably the best-scrubbed place in the county," she added.