Two patients, aged 57 and 84, who were offered a chicken sandwich just days apart during a stay in a British hospital, died after contracting listeria bacteria, an investigation has found.
“This case concerns the death of two people who there is reason to suspect died of a notifiable disease, namely listeria,” coroner Zach Golombek is said to have presented to the coroner’s court in Manchester, UK, on Monday, according to the Independent.
Nearly five years after the deaths of retired nurses Beverley Soah and Enid Heap, a court seated a jury of five men and two women to examine the circumstances that allegedly led to the deaths of the two patients in 2019, after they had been offered the same type of care. Sandwich a few days apart.
According to the investigation, the two women were staying at Manchester Royal Infirmary (MRI) when the hospital provided them with a chicken sandwich with mayonnaise from The Good Food Chain, on April 17 and 18, 2019, according to what was stated in the investigation published by the British newspaper.
The 50-year-old, who was suffering from advanced breast cancer at the time, would lose her life the following week, on April 26, after contracting an infection with Listeria bacteria “which she contracted in the hospital,” according to the investigation.
For her part, the octogenarian, a mother of five children, died in similar circumstances on May 6.
Listeria bacteria, which causes listeriosis, can be fatal to patients with weakened immune systems, according to British media.
At the time, the listeria outbreak in Manchester was shown to have the same genetic link to another outbreak in Liverpool, while the food company that produces the sandwiches was making up to 40,000 of them a day, supplying around 70 hospitals in the country.
Since then, the food company, as well as its chicken supplier, North Country Quality Food Company, have reportedly closed up shop.
The investigation is expected to continue throughout the week to try to learn from these two deaths and see if they could have been avoided.
