“The road to recovery will be long.” In early September, fifteen cases of botulism were detected in France after patients consumed canned sardines in a Bordeaux restaurant, the Tchin Tchin Wine Bar. The General Directorate of Health announced the death of a 32-year-old woman who had visited Bordeaux with his partner before returning to his home in the Paris region. She was one of these fifteen cases.
Of the fourteen remaining cases, eleven were hospitalized, eight of them in France. Of these eight, six are in intensive care at the Bordeaux University Hospital. Among them is Matthew, a 41-year-old American architect, who was on vacation in Gironde at the time of the events.
“They tasted normal.”
In an interview granted to ParisianKristy, his wife, also infected but less seriously, gives news of her husband and recounts the hours of suffering that preceded Matthew’s hospitalization.
It all starts on Monday, September 4. The couple wants to discover local culinary specialties and goes to Tchin Tchin Wine Bar, “especially for its natural wine.” “We tried several and also enjoyed sausages and sardines as an appetizer,” she recalls.
Although the owner of the establishment admitted to throwing away jars of smelly sardines, Kristy assures him that the fish they ate that day looked perfectly edible.
“Since I don’t eat much, I caught very few, maybe one and Matthew, two. They tasted normal. They weren’t the best sardines of my life but they weren’t bad either,” he says.
It was the next morning, while on a wine tour, that Matthew’s condition suddenly worsened. “We were cycling through the vineyards when he started seeing double and feeling dizzy. He could no longer drive and the trip organizers had to come pick us up in a van,” he recalls from the Ile-de-France newspaper.
The forty-year-old man decides to take a shower and go to bed while Kristy goes back for a three-hour walk. When she returned, her partner’s health deteriorated further.
“When I pushed the door he was in very bad condition. His mouth was very dry, his tongue was numb and he couldn’t swallow. I panicked, I thought he was having a stroke. I called 112. They took him to Saint-André Hospital,” he explains. the 40-year-old American.
“To communicate, write on a blackboard.”
Despite his admission to the hospital, doctors did not immediately detect the case of botulism, a disease that remains rare. “The brain scan and blood tests showed nothing,” Kristy explains to Le Parisien, as her symptoms continue to worsen.
“The next day, September 6, I could no longer speak. […] Matthew was admitted to intensive care and then intensive care. He needed oxygen. With his finger he drew the letters ‘Breathe’. He couldn’t do it anymore. He is a very brave person mentally but he was scared. The doctors decided to intubate him. He couldn’t even open his eyes,” he said.
It was then that the botulism hypothesis first emerged in the mouths of doctors. However, tests were necessary, the results of which could not be known for five days. At the same time, the American also became ill with the same, less severe symptoms, and was not hospitalized.
“Finally, on September 10, they asked me if I had eaten at the Tchin Tchin Wine Bar because there were other cases of poisoning. It was botulism! Then Matthew and I received an antidote,” recalls who says he doesn’t blame anyone. to the doctors for his delay. “It’s such a rare disease that we can’t imagine getting it.”
However, Matthew’s condition remains extremely worrying, although stable. “He is still intubated in intensive care. He cannot see or speak. To communicate, he writes on a whiteboard. I hope he can walk again. And we don’t know when we will return home,” he concludes.
Open investigation
After the appearance of these cases of botulism, the Bordeaux prosecutor’s office decided to open a preliminary investigation. The investigation is open for the crimes of unintentional injuries, involuntary manslaughter, marketing of foods harmful to health and sale of corrupt or toxic foods.
The investigation is entrusted jointly to the judicial police of Gironde, the Central Office for combating attacks on the environment and public health (OCLAESP) and the Departmental Directorate for Population Protection (DDPP). According to information from BFMTV, So far two complaints have been filed. in front of the Bordeaux prosecutor’s office, but this couple is not one of them.
For its part, the provisional autopsy report of the deceased patient concluded that death due to asphyxiation could be due to botulinum acid poisoning.
Source: BFM TV
