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Home-Canned Beans Lead to Botulism in Ohio

By Pritzker | Ruohonen

Three members of an Ohio family who ate home-canned green beans and became poisoned with Botulism are in their seventh week of hospitalization, but steadily recovering.

This weekend, more than 400 people attended a medical fundraiser for the trio at St. Joseph's Convocation Center in Crestline Ohio, near their home. 

Joann Palm told the Mansfileld News Journal newspaper that her 15-year-old son is progressing faster than her parents, Norbert and Florence Reinhard. Still, she said, the boy  faces an additional 12 weeks of recovery.

The Reinhards, who have been canning vegetables at home for 50 years, are being treated at MedCentral/Mansfield Hospital while their grandson is at Children's Hospital in Columbus. Two other family members who ate the beans on Sept. 10 also became ill, but were treated for Botulism infection and released from the hospital within days.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an average of only 145 people a year in the U.S. are infected with Botulism. Of those, only about 15 percent are foodborne cases. In most of those cases, there is a link to home-canned foods with low acid content, according to the CDC..

Botulism produces a  toxin that can cause muscle paralysis and respiratory failure. Symptoms include double vision, blurred vision, incontinence and muscle weakness.

Another case of Botulism -- this one at a horse breeding farm near Ocala, Fla., -- was recently implicated in the deaths of 100 horses. Ocala.com reported today that a state veterinarian identified the source of the equine outbreak as a local batch of hayledge -- grass that is cut and wrapped and allowed to ferment.

The horses that were sickened by Botulism suffered nervous system damage and were euthanized.

Full post as published by Food Poisoning Law Blog on November 03, 2008 (boomark / email).