As health officials nationwide expanded their investigation into a national E. coli outbreak apparently linked to contaminated spinach Friday, adding new cases in a dozen more states, Utah grocers were pulling spinach off the produce shelves and restaurants were taking spinach dishes, especially salad, temporarily off their menus.
On Thursday, the Food and Drug Administration announced an apparent outbreak of enterohemorrhagic E. coli involving 50 people in eight states, and by Friday evening, cases were reported in at least 20 states. Utah health officials said they have 11 cases now being investigated primarily.
The FDA also announced Friday that the outbreak had been traced to Natural Selection Foods, based in San Juan Bautista, Calif. The company bagged spinach for the brand names Rave, Natual Selection, Earthbound Farms, Trader Joes' Ready Pac, Green Harvest, and Dole.
While Natural Selection has voluntarily recalled their products, the FDA is not saying that they are the only company that is the source of the infection, nor have they said what caused the contamination. Their investigation, which is focused on the California regions that supply approximately 50 percent of the fresh spinach this time of year, is still ongoing.
Utah's own investigation currently includes cases under the jurisdictions of the Salt Lake Valley, Tooele, Utah, Bear River, Weber-Morgan health departments, according to Charla Haley, a spokeswoman for the Utah Department of Health.
"While these cases are primarily along the Wasatch Front, public health officials reiterate that this is related to a national investigation and risk is not unique to residents along the Wasatch Front," she told the Deseret Morning News.
Although the warnings only applied to fresh bagged spinach, stores and restaurants in Utah were not taking any chances.
"This was put out by the FDA as a consumer alert, so anything we do is voluntary and precautionary," said Marsha Gilford, spokeswoman for Smith's stores, which has 131 stores in seven states, including 47 throughout Utah. "Within two hours of the alert going out, we started the wheels in motion" to pull all bagged spinach from shelves. Friday morning, they decided to pull any fresh salad mixes that contain spinach. And as an added precaution, they removed bulk fresh spinach.
"We decided it's best to take all precautions until the FDA sorts it out," Gilford said. Smith's parent company, Cincinnati, Ohio-based Kroger Foods, has also announced that spinach in any of their other stores — including Fred Meyer and Food 4 Less — was removed Friday.
Other stores responded similarly. Harmons removed all fresh spinach products from their shelves, salad bars and any other prepared dish, as did Wild Oats stores.
"We've pulled everything, from our bagged spinach to the mixes we use in our salad bars," said Krista Coleman, spokesperson for Wild Oats markets.
Commissaries on Hill Air Force Base and other military bases in Utah were directed by the U.S. Department of Defense to take all of the spinach and salad mixes with spinach from their shelves.
Sizzler USA plans to replace all of their spinach-based salad mixes with other lettuces at their salad bar, even though their spinach supplier is not being investigated as a source of the problem, said spokesman Mike Branigan.
"It's a precautionary measure, even though there's no hint of it here," he said. "But everyone is worried, so we're not serving any spinach until the FDA tells us it's safe."
The National Restaurant Association, the largest food service industry group, issued an advisory to its members Friday to "follow the FDA's guidance and temporarily remove fresh and fresh-processed spinach and other fresh produce items that include spinach from their menus during this investigation." Many restaurants have already followed this advice, according to a news release from the association.
Lunchtime diners at Nordstrom's restaurant Friday who ordered salad were told that all the salads were being made with romaine lettuce and no spinach was available.
The FDA Friday evening said at least some of the cases appeared to be linked to spinach marketed by a California grower. Cases of E. coli are reportedly also being investigated in California, Connecticut, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Nevada, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but that list may expand further. The single death related to the outbreak occurred in Wisconsin.
E-mail: lois@desnews.com