10 Jun 2011
Latest on E. coli situation in Hamburg
The relevant press release can be viewed in its original (German) form at: http://www.rki.de/cln_178/nn_205760/DE/Content/Service/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/2011/08__2011.html
Until an official English version is released, an unofficial translation is found below:
Combined Press Release for the Federal Institute of Risk Management (BfR), Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food Safety (BVL) and the Robert Koch Institute (RKI).
1. The German health authorities (BfR, BVL and RKI) have come to the conclusion that the present general recommendation for Northern Germany to refrain from eating pickles, tomatoes and leafed lettuce, will no longer be in force.
2. The authorities also recommend to continue the usual hygienic measures, but to abstain from the consumption of raw sprouts. Households and restaurants are advised to destroy sprouts still in stock and the food stuffs that may have come into contact with the sprouts.
3. The institutes recommend further that all foodstuffs originating from one specific producer in Lower Saxony be taken off the shelves and not be sold.
4. The institutes recommend to strictly follow the general hygienic measures in regards to food consumption and patient care.
This notice replaces the previous notification from the institutes on the consumption of pickles, tomatoes and leafed lettuce.
Awareness of human diseases
Current Situation
Various surveillance processes by the RKI attest to the perception that the number of new EHEC infections is declining. The Sentinel surveillance system in hospital emergency rooms shows that the daily number of patients with cases of bloody dysentery, a first indicator of possible EHEC infection, as well as cases of ill women in the region of EHEC cases, are continuously declining. In addition, mathematical models in regards to delayed notification times of cases have shown that, despite a time delay, notifications are declining in numbers. This goes for the date of infection as well as for the date of hospitalisation. Such a decline can be attributable to a change in eating habits throughout the population, particularly in terms of the consumption of pickles, tomatoes and leafed lettuces (which indirectly also affects the consumption of raw sprouts) or it can show a general ebbing of the sources of infections at large.