Chipotle In Deeper Trouble As Fresh sickness Outbreak Reported

Overall, inspectors from the Seattle & King County Public Health Department conducted 82 inspections at 17 Chipotle locations since January 2014, logging a total of 50 unsatisfactory reports. Chipotle founder and co-CEO Steve Ells went on NBC’s Today to publicly apologize for the company’s spate of health scares. Now, Boston College announced on Monday that over 20 of its students, including eight of its men’s basketball players, have fallen sick after eating at a Chipotle restaurant. So while Chipotle may get to the bottom of the E. coli outbreak eventually and restore its reputation, it may take a while, and the underlying factors are concerning for the company. “We’re doing a lot to rectify this to make sure this doesn’t happen again”.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said that at least 52 people in nine states have been sickened in an E. coli outbreak so far, with 47 of them having eaten at Chipotle.

“Red violations indicate improper practices or procedures identified as the most prevalent in contributing to food-borne illness”, the department said. “This includes the original cases in Washington and OR, as well as those later reported in California, Ohio, New York, Minnesota, Illinois, and Maryland”, Chipotle said in an official announcement on December 10. The latest outbreak came just a couple of months after a disastrous nine-state E.coli outbreak, which rendered dozens of people seriously ill and was likewise linked to Chipotle restaurants. “We are looking into a cause of that and will address it”, a spokesman said in an email.

Maybe, depending on how many people get sick.

Boston College reported Thursday that 141 students had told college health officials they had become ill after eating at the restaurant.

In case the test results do reveal that there was no E. coli outbreak, it would be reassuring in some manner for Chipotle, which has been trying to reassure its consumers over the course of the past few weeks.

In addition to not keeping food hot enough, the Boston restaurant was cited for having a sick employee working on December 3, right before the weekend when the norovirus cases were reported. Stephen Anderson, an analyst at investment bank and wealth manager Maxim Group, said the Boston illnesses are a “near-term negative reinforcement” when viewed along with the E. coli outbreak and other health-related issues Chipotle has dealt with since the summer. Since 2009, when the CDC began tracking outbreaks, it’s been much more common for fast-food restaurants to give their patrons salmonella (sit-down restaurants typically see a higher number of people infected with norovirus).