Chorizo likely source of salmonella at Firefly
Almost 300 people have become ill as a result of eating at the Paradise Road Firefly restaurant during a six-day period in April, according to a new report released Wednesday by the Southern Nevada Health District.
The official number, 294, is an increase of almost 100 individuals who have reported symptoms of diarrhea and/or vomiting since the health district’s May 10 interim report. Authorities say the victims hail from 27 states and two foreign countries.
The report, filed by epidemiologist Linh Nguyen, shows that of the 21 food items analyzed by health investigators, cooked chorizo, a type of sausage, tested positive for salmonella, a bacteria that is a common cause of food poisoning.
“It is likely that the outbreak was due to local cross-contamination in the restaurant’s kitchen and not from a contaminated commercial food,” the report states.
Nguyen said it is still unknown how the salmonella was introduced into the chorizo but pointed out that food inspectors who visited the Firefly after complaints of illness cited the restaurant with 44 demerits, including food stored at improper temperatures, employees handling food without gloves and raw meat stored in a way that allowed liquid to drip on other food.
There is a small chance, Nguyen said, that the raw chorizo that was shipped to the restaurant was already contaminated and was not cooked at a high enough temperature to kill the bacteria. But she noted that there are no other current cases of salmonellosis with the same outbreak strain in the United States as that experienced at the Firefly.
Had contaminated raw chorizo been shipped throughout the country, she said, it is far more likely that other people would have been affected by the same strain of bacteria. .
Still, “due to a small possibility that raw chorizo was contaminated prior to arriving at Firefly,” she said, efforts to trace back to the food source remain underway. She also said other parts of the country are being monitored for the same outbreak strain of salmonella.
In a statement released Wednesday through a public relations firm, restaurant owner John Simmons responded to the health district’s latest report.
“From day one, our concern has always been doing everything we could for those affected and doing everything we could to use this time to make Firefly the safest place to eat in southern Nevada,” the statement read in part. “We’ve hired a food safety consultant with over 30 years of experience to double and triple check our methods and we’ll operate in the mode of continuous improvement.”
Contact reporter Paul Harasim at pharasim@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2908.
