One person died among a dozen suffering from botulism, a neurological disease caused by a powerful toxin, after eating canned sardines in the same restaurant in Bordeaux on Sunday.
“It’s totally exceptional”, underlines Benjamin Clouzeau, resuscitation doctor at Bordeaux University Hospital. Twelve people contracted botulism after a restaurant in Bordeaux, the Tchin Tchin Wine Bar, served them sardines in a jar, between Monday September 4 and Sunday September 10, said the Regional Health Agency (ARS) of Nouvelle-Aquitaine during a press conference on Wednesday. One of them, a 32-year-old woman, died in the Paris region.
>> One woman dead, nine people hospitalized… What we know about botulism poisoning in a Bordeaux wine bar
“Twelve cases linked to a single poisoning, this represents the number of annual cases in France as a general rule for this disease”, he adds. The investigation will have to determine in what circumstances the victims were poisoned, but the Tchin Tchin Wine Bar is a tapas bar “where several people could pick from the dish. Which explains the number of subjects exposed”says this doctor.
The Nouvelle-Aquitaine Regional Health Agency indicates that it “could have new cases until this weekend”. Because if the symptoms occur “in the 72 hours following ingestion, we can see symptoms evolving in a slower and more sudden, acute manner, leading to a serious form of the disease for up to eight days”, explains Benjamin Clouzeau. Gold, “the last meal taken in this potentially incriminated restaurant is Sunday September 10, so until next Sunday”.
“Botulinum toxin is used in bioterrorism”
An alert was issued to all health professionals in France, but also a global alert since some customers of this tapas bar were foreigners. This is important because there is anti-toxin treatment. “It aims to block the toxin before it attaches to the nerves and causes a prolonged blockage of nerve function”indicates Benjamin Clouzeau who specifies that “botulinum toxin is used in bioterrorism”
“It is a potential weapon of war because it has a very, very strong and prolonged nerve blocking power.”
Benjamin Clouzeau, intensive care doctor at Bordeaux University Hospitalat franceinfo
So, this “anti-toxin is part of strategic stocks that the army has in the context of bioterrorism and these stocks could be made available to our patients in order to be able to treat them”adds this resuscitation doctor at Bordeaux University Hospital.