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Source of Oklahoma Outbreak Remains a Mystery

By Dan Flynn and Suzanna Schreck

Oklahoma Health Department investigators finished interviews and data evaluation without identifying the source of a Salmonella outbreak that infected 17 people in three counties, NewsOK, the Oklahoman newspaper's online news service, reported over the weekend. 
Sickened were 14 school-age children in the Mustang School District in Canadian County, a young adult in Carter County and a 53-year-old woman in Oklahoma County, who recovered after five days in intensive care, the newspaper said.
Laurence Burnsed, the Oklahoma Health Department's communicable disease division director, told the newspaper the investigators "suspect a couple of different sources could have caused the outbreak but were unable to pinpoint anything."
Investigators were not able to find food items common to all the victims, the NewsOK story stated.  The department checked on a similar Salmonella strain that labs in Iowa and Nebraska had confirmed, but found no commonalities, according to the Oklahoman.
No new cases have been identified in Oklahoma since Oct. 4, the newspaper said.

Full post as published by Food Safety News on October 18, 2010 (boomark / email).