The number of lab-confirmed cases of salmonella food poisoning linked to Sarnia's Barakat restaurant on Lambton Mall Road continue to climb.
Lambton Public Health announced Friday, October 30, that four Salmonella cases had been confirmed and the number of confirmed cases increased to 15 Monday.
Medical Officer of Health Dr. Sudit Ranade provided a further update to Lambton County Council Wednesday morning.
"There are, at least, about 24 lab-confirmed cases to date, over 100 people who we consider probable cases based on their telling us that they have symptoms and their exposure and a few hospitalizations as well," said Ranade. "So, this is another serious infectious disease that we are working actively to control."
Dr. Ranade said a particular source of the infection has yet to be identified.
"We're disclosing numbers of cases and we're disclosing the broad scope, the epidemiological details, to give you an overview of what's happening in that outbreak."
Dr. Ranade said their disclosure for salmonella and COVID-19 are similar.
"The difference, if you're talking about disclosure of setting, that's really based on what we consider the exposure to be. So, it's disease, exposure, action. This is a foodborne disease, we know that the exposure is having eaten the food and so, in order to identify people who might have been exposed who may need to take action, we identify the place where they may have been exposed because that was the setting where they ate the food."
He said if there was a different kind of exposure, the health unit would judge that based on its risk assessment and understanding of both disease and exposure.
The restaurant has voluntarily closed while the investigation continues.
Anyone who ate at Barakat Mediterranean Cuisine between October 21 and October 29 and became ill with symptoms like diarrhea, fever, stomach cramps and vomiting, is asked to call Lambton Public Health at 519-383-8331.
