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19
made at the bakery, when it was learned that one of the staff had
been absent from work since the week-end suffering from an illness
similar to the cases of food poisoning already notified. It was
thought likely that he might have been the origin of the infection,
but as a precaution, samples of excreta from all the other bakery
staff were obtained for bacteriological examination. This was
fortunate, as bacillus aertrycke was isolated from one of these
samples. Meantime both St. Giles' and Belgrave Hospitals reported
that the same organism had been found in the stools of the patients
nursed there. The baket was asked to suspend his employee until
certified fit to return.
The bacteriological reports upon the piping bag and samples of
cream taken on the 19th were received on the 24th May, in which
the bag was shown to be infected and was therefore presumably
the one used on the 15th May to fill the cream buns and eclairs.
Samples of other ingredients used in the bakery were all found free
from the infection.
The deductions which can safely and logically be drawn are that
the faecal carrier of bacillus aertrycke employed in the bakery
infected the synthetic cream which conveyed the infection to the
ninety-three cases of food poisoning.
In order to limit and, if possible, prevent a second crop of
infections, information of the outbreak was sent to the medical
officers of health of other districts. Information was obtained in
Lambeth that some of the victims were themselves engaged in
various food distributive trades, handling food for human consumption.
Employers were advised to stand these off work until
ceitified by their doctors to be fit to return to duty with safety to
others. The incubation period varied from seven to over sixty
hours and the duration of illness from seven to fourteen days.
There were fortunately no deaths, but the more severe cases were
completely prostrated in the early days, and the measure of the
misery and anxiety to the relatives as well as to the sick can be
better imagined than assessed.
Bacillus aertrycke used to be associated almost exclusively with
duck eggs at one time, but with the great increase in communal
feeding during the war years and since, it has been proved again
and again to be the cause of food poisoning outbreaks behaving
like bacillus paratyphosus B, which has been in the past responsible
for innumerable outbreaks caused by lack of ordinary cleanliness in
the preparation of food for others by carriers who are seldom aware
of their condition until proved to be the originators of an epidemic.
The Public Health (Infectious Diseases) Regulations, 1927,
empower a local authority to forbid an employer to permit a carrier
of enteric or dysentery to work in a business which entails the