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Case Results Articles - Foodborne Illness

• Case Results
  • School Teacher Rendered Quadriplegic After Eating Contaminated Hot Dog - Then Dies

    Christine B., a 57 year old school teacher was rendered a quadriplegic and ultimately died after nearly two (2) years and over $1 million in medical bills. She contracted Listeriosis from eating contaminated hot dogs and lunchmeats processed and sold by a large supermarket chain. Unlike other pathogens, listeria monocytogenes [LM] may not manifest symptoms for several weeks leading to a delayed diagnosis, long after the food product and packaging are gone. For that reason, LM cases are complex and costly, requiring complex expert analysis of the DNA (serotype) of the pathogen and the eating and shopping habits of the victim to establish the causal connection between the illness and the food product. Contentious litigation and discovery revealed that the processing plant had an alarming history of product contamination that was ignored by management so as to avoid a massive recall. The plant shipped over 1.7 million pounds of product to its supermarkets during this time and it was only after the lab tipped off the USDA that a massive recall was initiated. By then it was too late for Christine and the bacteria attacked and destroyed her cervical spinal cord. Christine was survived by three adult daughters who continue to be haunted by the feelings of helplessness and hopelessness while watching their mother suffer the nightmare of horrors of quadriplegia until she died. After over four years of litigation the case was settled for a substantial confidential sum.

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