Nearly a week after a woman in Finland died from botulism poisoning — the result of eating tainted Italian olives — a U.S. distributor is warning consumers not to eat Bio Gaudiano Organic Olives Stuffed with Almonds because they may be contaminated with the Clostridium botulinum toxin.
The distributor, Pure Italian of Watertown, MA, together with the manufacturer and packer, Bio Gaudiano of Italy, are recalling all sizes of glass jars and cans and all lots of the Bio Gaudiano almond-stuffed olives, which were sold at the SoWa farmers market in South End, MA, and also distributed to other Massachusetts retailers.
The recalled organic olives sold at the SoWa farmers market were in 314 ml glass jar with a white label that reads Bio Gaudiano and a green twist-off metal lid with the lot number E0511X and an expiration date of 05/2013.
Other sizes and lots of the organic Italian olives went to unnamed Massachusetts retailers, according to the recall notice. The notice did not include label information on those products.
In Finland, two adults from the same household were hospitalized, and one died after eating Bio Gaudiano almond-stuffed olives. Both were diagnosed with botulism and their jar of stuffed organic olives was subsequently discovered to contain the toxin, the National Institute for Health and Welfare reported.
The Bio Gaudiano organic almond-stuffed olives implicated in the Finland botulism cases had the lot H2510X and an expiration date of 09/2012.