Madrid, (EFE).- Laboratory analyzes have confirmed a case in Madrid associated with the consumption of potato tortillas distributed by the Palacios group, which has already withdrawn them from the market, with which there are already five affected by this outbreak, which leaves two other suspicions in Malaga and the Valencian Community.
This is a 49-year-old person who began his first symptoms on July 10 and whose case was reported four days later by the Public Health Directorate to the Health Alerts and Emergencies Coordination Center (CCAES), which until yesterday maintained him as a probable case of poisoning from this outbreak.
According to the report that the CCAES has just updated, those affected by botulism remain at seven, but now with five confirmed -in addition to the one from Madrid, the two Italian citizens who bought one of these tortillas in Valladolid on June 30 and two other people from Asturias and Galicia- and two probables, one in Malaga -a 27-year-old person who has not required hospitalization- and the Valencian Community.
A “very, very, rare” disease
However, the director of the Agency for Food Safety, Environmental Health and Consumption of Asturias, José Ignacio Altolaguirre, has called for calm because it is a “very, very, infrequent” disease generally associated with poorly processed homemade preserves and in some cases to sausages, but “never” to packaged tortillas, so that this outbreak is something “very unusual.”
The Asturian patient, a 53-year-old man, has been admitted to the hospital since July 4 -although the confirmation of botulism did not occur until last Monday- and “is progressing favourably”.
All of them had a history of having consumed pre-cooked potato tortilla, packaged and purchased in different supermarkets in various communities with different brands and, according to information from the Spanish Agency for Food Safety and Nutrition (Aesan), in at least four of the company producer is the same, which does not quote.
Withdrawal of affected products
The agency dependent on the Ministry of Consumption has asked the autonomous communities to verify the withdrawal of the products affected by the outbreak from the marketing channels after the Palacios Group has decided to withdraw the fresh packaged potato tortilla produced in the Mudrian (Segovia) factory and the temporary stoppage of its manufacture.
Although until now it has not been possible to establish evidence, neither in the products nor in the processes, that relates cause and effect, this morning the Palacios Group has asked all people who have purchased any of these products (Palacios, Chef Select, Auchan, Eroski, Unide, Consum, DIA, Ametller, Condis, El Corte Inglés, Carrefour, Alipende, Grupo IFA and Rikissimo) to refrain from consuming it and return it. at the point of sale.
The spokesman for the Junta de Castilla y León, Carlos Fernández Carriedo, explained that they have already been “withdrawn” from the commercial “shelves”; In the same way, the Madrid executive has guaranteed that he has complied “with speed and diligence” with the protocol established by the health authorities, which has made it possible to immediately identify the product in question, isolate it and remove it from the shelves in Madrid supermarkets.
Consumer organizations such as Facua have asked Aesan to “redouble its efforts” in the investigation; Its spokesman, Rubén Sánchez, has urged Efe to “clarify the origin of the outbreak as soon as possible” and has indicated that “obvious” that no tortilla of the brand should be consumed “as a preventive measure regardless of whether they were affected or not.”
