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Competitiveness / Healthand Welbeing

Alarm in Sweden frozen berries associated with hepatitis A

Tuesday, 30 April 2013

Swedish authorities have alerted the public about the outbreak of hepatitis A linked to imported frozen berries and the number of people affected is growing.

According to Swedish media reports, the outbreak is now the largest in the world, which the Swedish authorities have been accused of being too slow to inform the public about the dangers of imported berries.

Another 12 Swedish cases of hepatitis A, have been identified in addition to the eight already identified earlier. They belong most probably to the same strain of the virus that was first discovered in Denmark, writes the Swedish daily, Svenska Dagbladet with reference to the Danish food authority.

This means that up to 20 Swedes may have contracted the outbreak linked to the imported frozen berries. Swedish National Food Administration has taken more than Finland and Denmark to recommend the boiling the imported frozen berries before consumption.

Last week the Swedish National Food Administration called on consumers to cook frozen berries purchased after the suspicions spread on grounds that they may contain hepatitis A virus, which can cause liver inflammation. The Finnish Food Authority had blown the alarm back in 2009 in which people were told to cook frozen raspberries and in Denmark it was done in the 2001 law that cafes and restaurants must boil imported, frozen raspberries.

Since the beginning of December, 56 cases of hepatitis A have been reported in Sweden, compared to the normal five cases a year.

by Scancomark.com Team