The Taipei City Government yesterday said its inspection of a restaurant linked to a bongkrek acid poisoning outbreak found that a specimen collected from the chef’s hands on March 24 had tested positive for the toxin, so the restaurant would be held responsible for the food poisoning.
Thirty people who ate at Polam Kopitam (寶林茶室) in Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 (Xinyi A13) between March 19 and 24 have reported falling ill after eating there, with most of them having eaten a stir-fried flat rice noodle dish called char kway teow (炒粿條).
Bongkrek acid, a rare toxin produced by contamination with a bacterium, especially in fermented coconut or corn food products, was found in the blood of 14 patients, including two who died, but the toxin was not found in food ingredients collected at the restaurant on March 26 or from the rice noodle dish supplier.
Photo: Tien Yu-hua, Taipei Times
Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) yesterday said when the city government received a report from the New Taipei City Government about the first death on March 24, it sent inspectors to check the restaurant and conducted environmental and food-worker specimen collections on that day.
The collected specimens included two from knives, one from a cutting board, and a swab sample from the chef’s hands, he said, adding that they were sent to National Taiwan University’s (NTU) Department of Forensic Medicine for testing on Monday, and the results came back positive in the evening.
“Polam, you cannot run away from your responsibility,” the mayor said, adding that upon receiving the test result, the city government immediately reported it to prosecutors and the city’s police department on Monday evening.
Taipei Department of Legal Affairs Commissioner Lien Tang-kai (連堂凱) said as the specimen tested positive, it can be confirmed that the food poisoning occurred at the Xinyi A13 restaurant, so the department would start negotiating with the concerned insurance companies about insurance claims, starting with the more urgent medical fees.
Chiang said details on the source and contamination route are being investigated by prosecutors, while the central government is cultivating the bacterium, and police are looking at surveillance cameras to clarify the situation.
After lawmakers questioned Minister of Health and Welfare Hsueh Jui-yuan’s (薛瑞元) assertion that flat rice noodles used in those few days are the most likely source of the toxin, Department Commissioner Chen Yen-yuan (陳彥元) said: “This is a very scientific assessment.”
Aside from testing, contact tracing investigators also conducted an epidemiological survey on the patients on what they ate in the past few days and at the Xinyi A13 restaurant, Chen said.
“Scientifically, we will determine what has the highest probability, so I believe there is no doubt about his assessment,” he said.
“This is why we all believe the flat rice noodle is the problem, in order of probability,” Chen said. “But [it can be better determined] if we can find any direct evidence, just like the hand swab sample collected by our frontline inspectors that tested positive, which is direct evidence that echoes the assessment made by the department and the ministry.”
Separately, NTU Department of Forensic Medicine adjunct associate professor Weng Te-i (翁德怡), who tested the specimens, yesterday said the specimens were collected on March 24 originally for common pathogenic bacteria cultivation as a normal procedure, because “at first, no one knew it was this serious.”
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) called a specialists’ meeting on Wednesday last week, in which the experts determined bongkrek acid to be a possible cause, she said.
As no common pathogenic bacteria grew after a week, Chen suggested testing the culture medium for bongkrek acid, and it unexpectedly came back positive, she said.
Finding the bongkrek acid on the chef’s hands can narrow the search for the toxin source to the restaurant’s kitchen, as previously the toxin was found in some patients’ blood samples, but they could have all been exposed to it from the tables in the food court or some other part of the department store, she said.
“We can now prove that bongkrek acid had been at Polam Kopitam in Xinyi A13 at the time,” Weng said, adding that the chef’s hands might not be the original source of the toxin, but his hands were exposed to it every time he touched the contaminated food ingredient, so the amount was low but still detectable.
Meanwhile, the CDC’s statistics showed that as of 5:30pm yesterday, 30 people fell ill after eating at the Xinyi A13 restaurant, including two deaths, four in intensive care, two still in hospital and 22 who have since returned to their homes after treatment.
AGING: As of last month, people aged 65 or older accounted for 20.06 percent of the total population and the number of couples who got married fell by 18,685 from 2024 Taiwan has surpassed South Korea as the country least willing to have children, with an annual crude birthrate of 4.62 per 1,000 people, Ministry of the Interior data showed yesterday. The nation was previously ranked the second-lowest country in terms of total fertility rate, or the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime. However, South Korea’s fertility rate began to recover from 2023, with total fertility rate rising from 0.72 and estimated to reach 0.82 to 0.85 by last year, and the crude birthrate projected at 6.7 per 1,000 people. Japan’s crude birthrate was projected to fall below six,
Conflict with Taiwan could leave China with “massive economic disruption, catastrophic military losses, significant social unrest, and devastating sanctions,” a US think tank said in a report released on Monday. The German Marshall Fund released a report titled If China Attacks Taiwan: The Consequences for China of “Minor Conflict” and “Major War” Scenarios. The report details the “massive” economic, military, social and international costs to China in the event of a minor conflict or major war with Taiwan, estimating that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) could sustain losses of more than half of its active-duty ground forces, including 100,000 troops. Understanding Chinese
SELF-DEFENSE: Tokyo has accelerated its spending goal and its defense minister said the nation needs to discuss whether it should develop nuclear-powered submarines China is ramping up objections to what it sees as Japan’s desire to acquire nuclear weapons, despite Tokyo’s longstanding renunciation of such arms, deepening another fissure in the two neighbors’ increasingly tense ties. In what appears to be a concerted effort, China’s foreign and defense ministries issued statements on Thursday condemning alleged remilitarism efforts by Tokyo. The remarks came as two of the country’s top think tanks jointly issued a 29-page report framing actions by “right-wing forces” in Japan as posing a “serious threat” to world peace. While that report did not define “right-wing forces,” the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs was
US President Donald Trump in an interview with the New York Times published on Thursday said that “it’s up to” Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be “very unhappy” with a change in the “status quo.” “He [Xi] considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing, but I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that. I hope he doesn’t do that,” Trump said. Trump made the comments in the context
RSS