Winnipeg restaurant closed, another fined in E. coli outbreak

A Winnipeg burger restaurant has been closed, and another was fined, after a recent E. coli outbreak in the city.

George's Burgers and Subs on Henderson Highway was one of the restaurants that purchased its meat from the Dutch Meat Market in St. Boniface.

On Friday, Winnipeg health authorities said that meat contaminated with E. coli had been traced to the butcher shop.

While the Dutch Meat Market and several burger restaurants have now been given a clean bill of health from authorities, George's Burgers and Subs did not pass a second inspection on Friday. It was not known how long the restaurantwill beclosed.

Another restaurant, the Dairi-Wip Drive-In on Marion Street, wasfined for food-handling violations in connection with the outbreak.

Many human infections not connected to butcher's meat

Health officials are still trying to track down the original source of the meat, Dr. Pierre Plourde, medical officer of health for the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority, said on Tuesday.

Plourde said 40 per cent of the30 human E. coli infections reportedin the city at the beginning of August had no connection to the Dutch Meat Market.

"They bought their meat or they ate their ground beef in restaurants all over this city. So we're still on the hunt for that ultimate source," Plourde said.

"This summer appears to have E. coli-contaminated ground beef [at] much higher levels than what we've seen in the past."

Plourde said that in response to making public the names of the businesses involved in the outbreak,about 70people have contacted health authorities with samples of meat they bought at Dutch Meat Market in the first two weeks of August.

He added those samples will be tested in an effort to track down the original source, which Plourde said isin either Manitoba or Alberta.

"It's a needle in a haystack, actually. It's quite a challenge," Plourde said.

"Cows carry this bacteria without being sick, so one cow could be slaughtered and inadvertently, unknowingly, contaminate meat and large quantities of meat when you put meat through a grinding machine.

Butcher 'trying to stay upbeat'

Dutch Meat Market owner Marcel Joanisse said Tuesday he was scared when he learned health inspectors were searching his store for the source of an E. coli outbreak.

"I was scared that it was our fault," he said. "I couldn't see how it was. But once we were actually cleared, I felt a little bit better, but still we feel bad that it did happen."

So far, Joanisse said he's not sure what the impact of the outbreak will be on his business.

"We're trying to stay upbeat right now," he said. "We're sure that it's going to affect our business to some degree.

"People are going to be scared for a little while and we're trying to reassure them that the store is clean, the product is not here and we really weren't responsible. As bad as we feel that this has happened, we're trying to conduct business as usual."

The August outbreak raised the total number of E. coli infections in the city this summer to 57. In all, therehave been65 cases so far this year.

Last year, the WRHA recorded only 13 cases of E. coli infection. In 2004, there were25.