{"id":33519,"date":"2026-08-19T11:33:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T11:33:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/33519\/"},"modified":"2026-08-19T11:33:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T11:33:15","slug":"belgium-hit-by-large-salmonella-outbreak-with-300-left-ill-after-eating-contaminated-eggs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/33519\/","title":{"rendered":"Belgium hit by large Salmonella outbreak with 300 left ill after eating contaminated eggs"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Salmonella outbreak at a<\/a> Belgian<\/a> poultry farm has left<\/a> at least 300 people sick and triggered mass egg recalls across nine countries, officials have said.<\/p>\n

Belgian health authorities told Food Safety News<\/a> that the Salmonella Enteritidis outbreak has surged from 236 cases in May, to 300 reported infections this month.<\/p>\n

Those who have reportedly contracted salmonella range from infants below the age of one, to a 96-year-old senior, with symptoms <\/a>including severe fever, vomiting, and dehydration forcing many to seek hospital care.<\/p>\n

The outbreak’s origins trace back to Laerco BV, an egg producer in Belgium. Since, food inspectors have been able to pinpoint the exact bacterial strain from an unlikely source: a sample of dust collected inside a chicken coop.<\/p>\n

\"300<\/p>\n

300 people in Belgium have now been infected with Salmonella (Getty)<\/p>\n

When regulators first detected the strain in May, contamination appeared confined to a single barn. However, recent testing has revealed that the bacteria had breached containment and spread to a second poultry house, forcing the Federal Agency for the Safety of the Food Chain (FASFC) to shut down and isolate the entire facility.<\/p>\n

Because eggs from the facility were shipped across European borders, the EU’s Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed launched international warnings across eight neighbouring countries: France<\/a>, Luxembourg<\/a>, the Netherlands<\/a>, Italy<\/a>, Spain<\/a>, Portugal<\/a>, Poland<\/a>, and Czech Republic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Authorities have urged consumers across these countries to inspect egg shells for the producer codes 2-BE-1073-01, 2-BE-1073-02, 2-BE-1073-03, and 2-BE-1073-04. Affected eggs carry shelf-life dates stretching through September 4.<\/p>\n

Health officials stress that contaminated eggs look, smell, and taste entirely normal.<\/p>\n

As labs take several weeks to undertake whole genome sequencing, Belgian authorities have said that the official tally of 300 cases is likely an underestimate.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, health authorities across the English Channel are on high alert as the UK battles its own severe Salmonella outbreak<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So far, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) has recorded 207 confirmed cases across Britain \u2014 with London (47 cases) and Yorkshire (38 cases) named as the worst-hit regions.<\/p>\n

The British outbreak has resulted in one death and an unusually high 38 per cent hospitalisation rate among victims.<\/p>\n

While the UKHSA has confirmed that available evidence suggests the UK outbreak is linked to imported eggs<\/a>, the country responsible for the the origin of the British cluster is yet to be determined.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Salmonella outbreak at a Belgian poultry farm has left at least 300 people sick and triggered mass…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33520,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[15898,7,18148,18150,17311,18151,18152,18149],"class_list":["post-33519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-belgium","tag-belgian-authorities","tag-belgium","tag-food-safety-news","tag-health-authorities","tag-neighbouring-countries","tag-poultry-farm","tag-salmonella","tag-salmonella-enteritidis"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/117121961635609230","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33519"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33519\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}