Restaurants identified in deadly outbreak of E. coli infections in Montana; supplier not named

Officials in Montana have identified restaurants that sold ground beef implicated in an outbreak of E. Coli O157:H7 infections that has killed one.

The Flathead City-County Health Department and the Montana Department of Public Health and Human Services continue to work together to investigate the outbreak originating in Flathead County.

Officials have not reported the producer or distributed the implicated ground beef.

On July 25, the local and state departments received confirmatory testing results of clinical and food samples verifying ground beef as the exposure of concern. Specifically, the source of the outbreak was wagyu beef from one lot number. All cases reported eating undercooked or made-to-order burgers made with wagyu beef at one of multiple restaurants in Flathead County. The last known date of consumption was July 14, 2024.

The following restaurants are associated with the 14 cases of reported illness in this outbreak: Gunsight Saloon; Hops Downtown Grill; Tamarack Brewing Company; the Lodge at Whitefish Lake; and Harbor Grille. Furthermore, based on information provided through case investigation, one individual has died after exposure to wagyu beef consumed at Harbor Grille.

Several other facilities — Flathead Fish, the Crawdad Café, and the Flathead Lake Lodge — received contaminated wagyu beef from the same lot number, but no reported illnesses have been associated with these establishments. Once the source of exposure was preliminarily identified, public health staff worked directly with affected businesses to ensure all remaining wagyu beef from the contaminated lot was removed from use. 

Samples of the suspected product were sent to the Montana Public Health Laboratory for testing, which allowed for laboratory confirmation of the outbreak source. None of the contaminated beef remains in circulation and all businesses associated with this outbreak have been contacted directly, according to the county health department.

(To sign up for a free subscription to Food Safety News,click here)