2:00pm Monday 14th September 2009
By Helen Orrell
OYSTER farmers blamed for an outbreak of food poisoning at a celebrity chef’s restaurant have pointed the finger at a sewage treatment works.
Colchester Oyster Fishery claims the works, run by Anglian Water on the River Colne, is responsible for contaminating its rock oysters.
The company has firmly denied the claim.
A report by the Health Protection Agency found shellfish supplied by the fishery was behind a food poisoning outbreak which affected more than 500 diners at Heston Blumenthal’s restaurant, the Fat Duck, in January and February.
The report said tests had found the norovirus, which causes vomiting and diarrhoea, was present in the fishery’s oyster beds.
A likely cause, the report said, was human sewage.
Graham Larkin, operations director at the fishery, based at East Road, East Mersea, said: “We were disappointed our oysters were associated with this.
“But we are victims as well, because our stock has been tainted by sewage Anglian Water has failed to treat. It also shows the Environment Agency, which polices this, is not doing a good enough job.
“We do thorough tests, including a count for norovirus, but the tests were good and were well below the threshold.
“The blame clearly lies at the sewage treatment plant.”
Mr Larkin said the firm had not harvested any oysters from the Colne since the outbreak, and there were no plans to do so.
It is no longer supplying oysters to the three Michelin-starred Fat Duck, in Berkshire, which reopened in March following the outbreak.
However, he said the wild oysters which grow at Pyefleet Creek were unaffected.
Mr Larkin said: “We have done everything in our power to put things right, including monthly testing for viruses and bacteria.
“It affects business, because we can’t harvest oysters in the area that’s in the line of the flow of the water.
“All we can do is reassure people we are harvesting from a different area.”
But Dan Baker, an Anglian Water spokesman, said there was no evidence to link the norovirus found in the oyster beds to the treatment works.
He said: “If the shellfish company has any other evidence, we would be interested to see it.
“If there is any kind of discharge it would be treated before it is discharged.
“When there are occasional consented discharges, such as in heavy rain, it’s predominantly rainwater, and that’s monitored by the Environment Agency.
“The shellfish company has been pointing the finger at us for so long, but there are all sorts of other things there, such as boats pumping things into the water. There is no evidence this is linked to us.”
The Environment Agency said, although it regularly monitors the water quality, it is not required to test for norovirus.
A spokesman said: “In any case, it is very difficult, almost impossible, to detect, as there are no set standards and no shellfish standards.”
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