One in a dozen people died of botulism, a serious and rare neurological disease, after eating handmade canned sardines at the same restaurant in Bordeaux last week.
The deceased victim was a 32-year-old woman who had visited Bordeaux with her partner before returning to her home in the Paris region.
According to Dr. According to Benjamin Clouzeau, an anesthetist and respiratory doctor at the Pellegrin hospital in Bordeaux, she presented to the emergency room of a hospital in the Île-de-France “with signs not very suggestive of illness” before she suddenly succumbed at home to cardiac arrest. His companion is in the intensive care unit.
The regional health authority (ARS) in Nouvelle-Aquitaine lists a total of 12 cases aged 30 to 40, excluding one woman in her 70s. Most are of foreign nationality (USA, Canada, Germany, Ireland).
Eight cases were hospitalized in Bordeaux, six of them requiring ventilation as of Wednesday afternoon, two in Île-de-France (the couple). A Spanish consumer was treated in Barcelona, as was another man in Germany, returned home and received care in his country. “Your period is not in danger,” said the doctor.
What all of these people have in common is that from September 4th to 10th they ate at the same restaurant, the “Tchin Tchin Wine Bar”, in Bordeaux, where tourist numbers are high in September.
In this city center eatery popular with Anglo-Saxon customers, all patients ate sardines from homemade jars.
Health authorities recommend that people who visited the restaurant on the same dates and have symptoms (diarrhea, vomiting, vision or speech problems) “urgently seek medical attention or contact 15”.
Given the delayed effect of the toxin that causes the disease, “we could have new cases by this weekend,” warned Benoît Elleboode, director general of the ARS.
Payment receipts and phone numbers of potential customers were collected from the restaurant. Up to 25 people may have consumed nine glasses of three or four sardines each, served at the table.
The Ministry of Health, through the WHO, has sent an alert to all health professionals in France and abroad.
Botulism is a serious neurological disease, fatal in 5 to 10% of cases, caused by a very strong toxin produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum, which develops particularly in poorly preserved foods due to inadequate sterilization.
In France, most cases of botulism are food poisoning due to the ingestion of the said toxin in sausages, cold cuts or preserves of family or artisanal origin.
“It is an extremely rare disease that has almost disappeared in France with an incidence of less than 0.4 per million,” said Dr. Clouzeau, describing the incident as “extraordinary.”
An antitoxin antidote was sent from a military warehouse in Marseille.
An inspection by the Departmental Directorate of Civil Protection (DDPP) was conducted at the facility on Monday, confirming a “manufacturing defect” in canned sardines.
“The restaurateur confirmed that when the jars were opened there was a bad smell and there was no vacuum,” emphasized Thierry Touzet, deputy director of the DDPP.
“The facility was fairly well maintained,” but the professional “has a very artisanal way of working that was not controlled,” he added, specifying that the facility had never been reported in the past.
The prefecture banned the manager from making new products “until further notice” and ordered a “thorough cleaning” of the bar-restaurant, which remained closed on Wednesday. All canned goods produced on site were recorded. The first results from the analysis of the samples are expected on Friday.
Botulism is a notifiable disease caused by neurotoxins that attack the nervous system, causing eye problems (double vision), difficulty swallowing and, in advanced forms, paralysis of the muscles, particularly the respiratory muscles, which can lead to death.
According to Dr. According to Clouzeau, treating patients in the intensive care unit is likely to take a long time, “because once the toxin is blocked and fixed, it paralyzes the muscles for several weeks,” with various risks of complications.