The search for clues to the source of the E.coli outbreak which has killed 19 Europeans and infected more than 1,700 worldwide was concentrated yesterday on a restaurant in the northern German town of Lübeck.
Some 18 people, including Danish tourists and a party of tax officials, fell ill after eating there. One has since died, and two others are in a critical condition.
It is not thought the eatery is directly to blame for any contamination, but, according to Werner Solbach, a microbiologist at the University Medical Centre Schleswig-Holstein: “The supply chain could give us important clues about how the pathogen was passed along.”