As the keynote speaker at the Food Integrity 2017 conference held recently by the Asia Pacific Centre for Food Integrity in Auckland, Marler is incredulous that New Zealand media is talking about a Northland restaurant owner complaining about being made to cook hamburger patties right the way through. “It amazes me,” he says, shaking his head. “I don’t believe it. What is that guy thinking?” He’s qualified to ask that question. In January 1993, Marler’s first client in the area of foodborne illness – nine-year-old Brianne Kiner – entered a Jack in the Box family restaurant near her home in Redmond, Washington and ate a child’s meal of hamburger, fries and drink. Several days later, her mother took her to a hospital, where staff diagnosed haemolytic uremic syndrome caused by E.coli O157:H7 bacteria. Her body was puffy and jaundiced, and she began bleeding from every orifice. Eventually, the little girl slipped into a coma, during which doctors removed her large intestine and hooked her heart, lungs and kidneys up to machines to keep them functioning. By Kathryn Calvert She suffered brain damage and was not expected to live, but 42 days later woke up and had to learn how to walk again. She was hospitalised for six months, and has been left with diabetes, asthma and kidney problems including a transplant. She is unable to have children, and suffered from terrible dreams filled with demons for years. In the weeks following Brianne’s admission to hospital, authorities in Idaho, California and Nevada reported numerous cases of E-coli infection amongst Jack in the Box customers. In all, 73 restaurants were linked to the outbreak, with more than 700 people sickened, 171 hospitalised and four deaths. A later investigation identified five slaughterhouses in the United States and one in Canada as possible sources of faecal matter in the meat that made so many people sick, but the exact location of the contamination was never pinpointed. However, Foodmaker - the parent company of Jack in the Box - had been warned beforehand by authorities and even its own employees that its hamburgers were being undercooked, but was loathe to change procedures and COVER STORY RISKY BUSINESS KEEPING FOOD SAFE Bill Marler isn’t embarrassed to say he ate his first hamburger in nearly two decades just the year before last. It’s not hard to guess why. As one of the world’s most accomplished personal injury lawyers specialising in foodborne illness litigation, Seattle-based Marler has seen things that most could not imagine. 14 JULY 2017
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