A banquet hall in New Taipei City’s Sinjhuang District (新莊) has been ordered to suspend operations amid an investigation into a suspected food poisoning outbreak affecting 62 people, the city’s health department said yesterday.
The New Taipei City Department of Health said it received reports on Sunday of people experiencing an upset stomach after attending banquets held by Watson’s Personal Care Stores (Taiwan) Co at Gala De Chine Xinzhuang Crystal Crown Plaza (雲品集團新莊晶冠館) on Tuesday and Wednesday last week.
Watson’s Taiwan, the nation’s largest cosmetics and drugstore operator, told the health department that 62 of the 2,201 people who attended the banquets last week reported having an upset stomach.
Photo: CNA
Although nine of them sought medical treatment, none were hospitalized, and their symptoms subsided, the department said, adding that it immediately sent inspectors to the banquet hall upon receiving the report.
On Sunday, health department officials inspected the restaurant based on the Regulations on Good Hygiene Practice for Food (食品良好衛生規範準則), and on Monday afternoon it ordered the banquet hall to shut temporarily, as the number of people who reported suspected food poisoning met its threshold to halt operations, it said.
The inspection found contraventions including unclean floors in its kitchen washing area and trash cans without lids, it said, adding that it asked the venue to improve within a set period.
No leftovers from the dishes served during the banquets last week were available for testing, the department said.
However, a dish called “hand-grasp seafood plate,” which includes a variety of seafood, German sausages and vegetables, as well as ice cubes could have posed a high risk of contamination, so samples of those ingredients were collected for testing, it said.
If the restaurant fails a second inspection, it can be fined NT$60,000 to NT$200 million (US$1,871 to US$6.24 million), and if pathogens exceeding the maximum allowable limits are found in the tests, it can be fined NT$30,000 to NT$3 million, under the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (食品安全衛生管理法).
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