13 replies to this topic

[Onion]

My mother bought two chicken and blue cheese sausages from Fresh Market two days ago. I cooked them thoroughly on the barbecue last night, along with two chorizo sausages, two burgers, and a big steak. My mother, father, and sister all ate these chicken sausages and are now very sick with salmonella. I called up Whole Foods and spoke to the risk management manager at their corporate office and explained what happened to him. What I'd like from you guys is a bit of help as to not get screwed and have them say "Oh, sorry, nothing we can do". Both my parents are self employed, so they don't get paid sick days. Both of them are currently far too sick to work, let alone just get out and drive my brother and sister to school etc. I'm leaving town on Saturday morning and my siblings start school on the 7th, and can't drive themselves. Has anyone had a similar experience with this? Any hints, tips, or advice?

[El_Capitan]

http://www.cdc.gov/o...eralpublic.html

[Bosco]

How sick are they?

 

I have been sick many times over the years from different foods, the best advice I can offer is no matter how sick they are or feel, they need to keep putting fluids into their bodies to flush their system out.

[Onion]

How sick are they?
 
I have been sick many times over the years from different foods, the best advice I can offer is no matter how sick they are or feel, they need to keep putting fluids into their bodies to flush their system out.

My mom is the one that got it worse, maybe because she ate the most of the contaminated food. She's very sick, hasn't been able to eat all day. We've been making her drink. She's spent her day in bed sleeping or in the bathroom with diarrhea or vomiting. My dad is similar, but not as bad, and my sister only had diarrhea but doesn't feel too bad.

[Master Binky]

_{In response to Bosco's suggestion, Pedialyte and it's like work great.}

 

_{edit: Why it's better than other rehydration drinks like Gatorade, Pedialyte uses artificial sweeteners instead of sugar to avoid additional dehydration from you're body's evacuation method of choice. Which is not a concern of Gatorade's target audience.}

Edited by Master Binky, 02 January 2013 - 01:43 PM.

[Onion]

_{In response to Bosco's suggestion, Pedialyte and it's like work great.}

 

Thanks Binky. I'll head to CVS and grab some. 

[Bosco]

Also if they are not taking them already Pepto Bismol chewable tablets. I find they work way better then the liquid.

[Kamikaze_Badger]

Salmonella genus bacteria have an extremely low infectious dose, so it's easy to undercook poultry products. When dealing with them, be sure to threaten legal action. Your family obviously isn't hurting for money and you can afford to hire a lawyer to write a letter.

 

EDIT: There's a strong chance that cross contamination occurred that introduced the bacteria to other food and such too.

Edited by Kamikaze_Badger, 02 January 2013 - 05:36 PM.

[Onion]

When dealing with them, be sure to threaten legal action. Your family obviously isn't hurting for money and you can afford to hire a lawyer to write a letter.

Thanks for answering my other question.

About the cross contamination, I don't think it happened, because I was the only one that hadn't eaten any of the chicken sausage, but it had touched everything else, which I ate. 

Edited by Onion, 02 January 2013 - 06:06 PM.

[dr_bowtie]

lol next time Par-Boil them first....

 

hope they feel better soon.... being sick sucks

[Tjj226_Angel]

 

When dealing with them, be sure to threaten legal action. Your family obviously isn't hurting for money and you can afford to hire a lawyer to write a letter.

Thanks for answering my other question.

About the cross contamination, I don't think it happened, because I was the only one that hadn't eaten any of the chicken sausage, but it had touched everything else, which I ate. 

 

 

Did you use any knives or utensils to help cook or handle the meat? If so, it is possible you might have reused on of the utensils on the uncooked meat, and then again on the cooked meat. 

 

It seems odd that if you really did cook the meat all the way through that they would all be that? sick. Even with cross contamination,  people normally don't get that sick.

 

Were the sausages something that were small enough where people had multiple helpings? If so then I could see you (or anyone for that matter) cooking them in a pan and using a spatula to roll them around. You touch the raw sausage with your spatula, and then you keep touching them until their done while still contaminating the food. The your family eats enough of them to get sick. The person who ate the most gets the most sick.

 

You probably have some salmonella in your system, but probably not enough to get sick where as everyone else got hit hard.

 

There again though, if that WERE the case, then god only knows how bad those sausages were to begin with.

 

Lastly, if sh!t hits the fan (hopefully that wont happen), and your family decides to press charges, you would be a million steps ahead if you take the time to sit down and write out what happened that night. Details in how you prepared the meat and so on would be very beneficial to your hypothetical case. The more time passes, the more you will forget, and the weaker your story becomes.  

[Kamikaze_Badger]

Salmonella has an extremely low infectious dose angel, and just a little can do a lot given how virulent it is. It's actually not surprising that they'd get that severe of a case of gastroenteritis from the meat. A little bit of salmonella or another enteric bug could easily have grown if it was displayed thawed like most meats are. You may have think you had them cooked thoroughly, but unless you stuck a thermometer in and checked the core temperature of each sausage, there's a good chance you didn't. It's easy to overestimate that.

 

Then again, we can't be sure it's salmonella without culturing it from a stool sample. Onion, get to it .