McDonald's In Bloomington, Ill. Linked To Rare Strain Of Salmonella In Area Restaurants

A McDonald's eatery in Bloomington, Ill. in McLean County was shuttered before the Thanksgiving weekend as investigators look into a suspected case of salmonella contamination. It remains closed.

Pantagraph.com writes that a range of confirmed salmonella cases were reported at several different restaurants in Central Illinois between October 18 and November 11, and "substantial information connecting the [McDonald's] to the cluster of salmonella cases was discovered last week." Investigators believe the sickenings were a result of human transmission rather than a specific food item.

Every employee at the McDonald's is being tested and the restaurant will not reopen until enough staff have been cleared to work.

County health department communications director Kera Simon said that salmonella sickenings linked to the restaurant account for "a low number of cases, less than 10, but it was not a mild strain of salmonella.”

Several outlets, including Barf Blog and CINewsNewsNow.com, are reporting that Simon expressed the opposite, but she emphatically stated that this is misinformation in a call to The Huffington Post.

"People that are sick, they know they're sick," Simon said. "They've been sick for a period of time." For about a week, these individuals have been suffering from particularly nasty cases of Salmonella Stanley, a rare strain that Food Safety News writes is rare outside of Southeast Asia and usually appears only in people who have traveled there.