Eighty Bostonian students sick with norovirus after eating at Chipotle

Moreover, 8 players on the Boston College Basketball team confirmed to have E.coli just moments after Boston College’s university medical staff sent out a campus-wide email notifying students and faculty that there were numerous people on campus that had become sick from the Chipotle restaurant in Cleveland Circle.

Many students at the school feared they were afflicted with E. coli.

A spokeswoman for the Boston Public Health Commission said the illnesses were likely caused by norovirus, but final test results aren’t expected for a couple of days.

Chipotle announced the temporary closure of the said restaurant while it coordinates with local health officials in investigations.

Locally sourced produce accounts for a “relatively small percentage” of the produce the chain uses, said Chris Arnold, a Chipotle spokesman. City officials said a restaurant employee was sick during a shift last week.

Officials in multiple towns and cities, including Framingham and Waltham, told the Herald they have expedited the inspections because of the recent outbreak.

The students all said they had eaten at a Chipotle in Boston’s Cleveland Circle over the weekend.

The symptoms include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and some stomach cramping.

Scott Zoback, of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, said it has been notified of the ailments and is investigating in conjunction with the Boston Department of Public Health. Norovirus can be contracted from an infected person or from contaminated food, water or surfaces. The first cases were reported at the end of October in OR and Washington, with additional cases being reported later.

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. The food poisoning caused many players to miss yesterday’s game.

Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc., based in Denver, had said that whatever the likely ingredient was that made people sick is out of its restaurants and that it is adopting stricter food-safety standards. The stock is down almost 25 percent in the quarter to date. Many cases of less unsafe illnesses like the norovirus, which Chipotle claims is the cause of the cases in Boston.

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