UK caterer closed after making 44 cops barf
Birmingham City Council said Monday the Meal Machine was closed under Food Hygiene regulations amid concerns over cleanliness and cross contamination of foods.
Earlier this month it was reported that at least 44 police officers suffered the effects of what appeared to be food poisoning, including severe diarrhoea and vomiting, as a result of packed lunches issued to the officers by … Meal Machine.
It is known a number of officers ate a chicken and stuffing sandwich supplied to them as part of a packed lunch prepared by an outside contractor.
A spokesman for Birmingham City Council’s environmental health department said the decision followed checks into processes and procedures, including “food handling, cross contamination, temperature control and general cleanliness”.
Food poisoning strikes Birmingham police
In 1984, the Pope visited the restored 350-year-old Jesuit mission of Ste. Marie-among-the-Hurons in Midland, Ontario. After departing, 1,600 hungry Ontario Provincial Police officers who had worked the ropes gathered for a boxed lunch. Of those 500 officers who chose ones with roast beef sandwiches, 423 came down with salmonella.
On Saturday, July 4, 2009, more than 40 police officers in Birmingham, U.K., were stricken with food poisoning after consuming a boxed lunch of a sandwich, packet of crisps, chocolate bar and piece of fruit, as they prepared to police a demonstration which passed off peacefully.
Dozens of fireman, police and ambulance staff rushed to the scene as British Transport Police shut the station at about 5pm on the advice of health agencies.
The station re-opened 50 minutes later.
Do you know where that finger's been? The risks of potlucks
Yesterday was the departmental Xmas potluck.
I didn’t go.
Not cause of the newborn, I just, on those rare occasions I get invited, avoid potlucks. There’s the ‘Hey, Food Safety Man, would you eat this,’ to which I politely smile and say sure, the biggest risk is not eating at all, cause I’m trying to be publicly polite, and meanwhile I’m not touching the sprout salad, the unpasteurized juices, the raw oysters (a big hit in Kansas) and the beef that’s been sitting at room temperature for 14 hours.
Besides, once I start pontificating, I can’t shut up. Maybe I just like to hear myself talk.
Some middle school students in Birmingham, Alabama, found out the hard way – meaning they barfed a lot – the risks of potlucks.
The Birmingham News reports that nearly half of the students in a Smith Middle School language arts class became ill Friday after tasting meals that students had prepared as part of an assignment.
Birmingham schools spokeswoman Michaelle Chapman said the students were to write about their favorite dish and how it was prepared. The teacher allowed them to make and bring the dish to class if they wished.
Of the 18 students, 16 of them brought in dishes and eight students got sick after tasting them.
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After seeing this story, one colleague wrote his daughter’s principal, asking if there was a policy about bringing food into schools to share with others. I did the same years ago after my daughter was almost exposed to unpasteurized cider as part of a class trip to the farm.
