Middle Eastern dish, ‘Turshi’, linked to Amarillo botulism cases
In a follow-up to a story last week, health officials from the City of Amarillo and federal and state officials conclude the four cases of botulism reported last week have a common food source, a homemade food, reported at two different residences.
Although the investigation is ongoing, health authoroties say through extensive interviewing, two clusters of two patients each have reported eating this same food item over several weeks, a traditional Middle Eastern dish called turshi.
Turshi is a fermented, pickled vegetable dish that is commonly served and was prepared at one of the residences. Investigators believe that during the fermentation phase of preparation lasting several weeks, conditions were ideal for bacteria growth and botulinum toxin production.
Because the food was consumed weeks ago, none of the turshi was available for testing. No commercial food product or restaurant has been linked to the outbreak.
The status of the four patients according to health officials is two patients remain hospitalized and two patients have been released.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, botulism is a rare but serious paralytic illness caused by a nerve toxin that is produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum.
Foodborne botulism, one of the five types of botulism, is caused by eating foods that contain the botulinum toxin.
In the United States, an average of 145 cases are reported each year.Of these, approximately 15% are foodborne, 65% are infant botulism, and 20% are wound.
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