An investigation is currently underway to explain an outbreak of food-borne botulism in Scotland. Three children in the same family were confirmed as having botulism following consumption of a meal made with a jar of korma sauce. Residual sauce from the jar, the jar lid and a remnant of the meal, all tested positive for Clostridium botulinum type A toxin. The children are recovering, although two remain ventilated and in intensive care unit.
Comment centres, in particular, on the fact that all three arose from consumption of widely distributed, commercially produced foods while the number of cases in all three was surprisingly low were a production fault assumed to have been the source of contamination. In the Scottish outbreak, indeed, the food originated from a state-of-the-art food-production facility where intensive investigation has yet to find any shortcomings, and no post-production event has been identified which could explain the contamination.
FoodWorld 