Food Poisoning at the Poly's Luau!

[Snickerdoodlesmommy]

The local NBC affiliate in Orlando is reporting an entire family has contracted food poisoning after eating at the Polynesian resort Hawaiian Luau. They went over to the Celebration Health hospital where a Dr. says that all 7 ate the chicken at the luau and had come down with food poisoning.
Disney offered to extend the vacation for these people but apparently they have declined the offer. An investigation is underway as no other guest complained after eating at the same luau on the same evening.
Interes :roll: ting...

LindaClaus :sun:

[KatEnigma]

Sounds fishy to me, if no one else came down with it. Somehow, I find it hard to believe that they were the only ones to eat chicken! :roll:

[Cinderella]

I too find it hard to believe that with the amount of people attending each luau, only one family got food poisoning. Nowadays the majority of people are eating chicken over beef. Wonder what else they may have eaten that day or brought with them? If this was a hoax, they would have taken up the Disney offer of a few free days. It is very strange.
:roll:


Cinderella

[ddoll]

Not if they were looking for a financial settlement, Claire!

[Cinderella]

Sad but true ddoll. See, I would never think to do that at all, especially not at DISNEYWORLD!!!!!

[Sheryl]

Very odd indeed. We went to the Poly Luau in July and thought the food was very good, as well as the show. And what a Hottie that flame juggler was. :oops:

Sheryl :minnie:

[DisneyPam]

I have my questions about this story...first of all they claim that they fell ill within a very short time of eating at the Luau. Most food poisoning takes longer to imact the victim. Furthermore, no other guests had any symptoms and there were no irregularities in food safety data. Also, I saw a bit of the medical report that appeared to state "gastroenteritis, food poisoning?" which would seem to indicate that this was only a possible diagnosis. Or maybe they really did have food poisoning but contracted it elsewhere? There are too many questions IMO.

[Joe]

I'm with you Pammy, there seem to be some irregularities here.....

[MargaretJ]

Does seem strange that the entire family got Food Poisioning. I will tell you that about 5 years ago I ended up in the Emergency Room for 6 hours after eating at The Pepper Market at Coronado Springs. They diagnosed it as Food Poisioning/Gastroenteritis & it came on very quickly. Disney was very kind in paying for the Ambulance, & Hospital & since the next day was the last day of our 8 day vacation gave us a late checkout so I could recoop a bit longer. To be honest I never even thought of suing Disney. I had Food Poisioning once a few years prior & my Dr said that sometimes if you have a bad case once your system is more susceptible. It does seem strange for a entire family but if they were as sick as I was they could not fake it.

[SuzyQ]

Hello?! Declined a free extended stay? I would be more than happy to be ill for a day for a few extra days at the world!! :oops: :mrgreen:

(ok, all joshing aside) That would be really too bad if they had food poisoning. I know that one of the reasons that I love eating at Disney (and the Poly in particular) is that they have very stringent food handling guidelines. When I worked at 'Ohana, we had to got through 4 days of special training in the kitchen BEFORE we could even get on the job (I was a server).

~Suzy

[Rosebud]

I have no idea if it is true or not, but I don't think the fact that they think no one else got sick means anything. There could have been other people that got sick that they don't know about. People that didn't connect it to that at all or report it. I speak from experience on that.

I used to work for a company that had a huge company picnic at a well known outing/banquet facility. I worked in a small close group, 5 of us including the boss.

One year I went to the picnic and had one teeny tiny piece of chicken which made me ill. Luckily for me I didn't get too sick because I had the teeniest piece and I was able to go to work the next day. I didn't mention it because I was the only one that stayed later at the picnic and my friends warned/teased me not to drink too much - free drinks you know. Since it was a work night I had no intention of drinking any alcohol, but if I told them I got sick they would have never stopped teasing me.

Anyhow, later that next day our head boss (from another building)stopped in and mentioned that a lot of people had gotten food poisoning at the picnic. We did find out it was from the chicken and I was the only one in my group of 5 that even tasted the chicken. However, if I hadn't found out from that other boss about the food poisoning I would have thought it was just something else.

Since so many people did work together in bigger groups, more people did realize what happened. But if it had been a different situation where everyone didn't know everyone most people probably wouldn't have known they had food poisoning.

I also realize from another experience that not everyone feels the same effects of food poisoning. Some people get violently ill while others may just have stomach cramps. If a mother and father are both the types that get real sick, I would imagine their kids probably have the same trait.

I'm not saying that it is really true or not, just trying to point out that it could be. No matter what the procedures are suppose to be or how strick the training, it only takes one careless person to taint food.

[TwirlerGirl]

Several years ago, we had a family reunion of sorts at WDW. My niece flew in from NY with her DD, my sister & her DH, my DH plus me from MD. The second night, we went to the ESPN Club, 3 of us shared Nachos w/meat. I was up half the night ill, neice and DH ill by 6 AM. We knew it was the ESPN Club's nacho's but suffered through the day at MGM, after all we're on vacation. I'm sure it was food poisoning but never reported it. Heard later on another broad that ESPN Club had a problem with food poisoning while we we down there. I wonder how many people at the Luau were ill and just didn't report it? If it wasn't to severe you can make it until it passes.

I think they can do a test to the stomack contents and determine if it food poisoning and from what food. We all know that Disney in general does a great job with food prep and serving but one little slip can make a mess. I hope there is a followup story.

Sandy

[Kylara]

Only follow up that has been mentioned is that the health inspector did a follow-up at the kitchen and didn't find anything. No others from the Luau have come forward and with all the publicity, I think if others got food poisoning, they would have at least reported it even if they weren't too bad to help narrow down the source.

So it stands that it is definate the family wasn't faking, but they can't narrow it down to the Luau's kitchen. However, that doesn't mean that it couldn't have been from the Luau either.

[DrBabe]

If a health inspector was there then for certain other public health workers are doing an epidemiological follow-up. Yes, it certainly doesn't make sense for one family alone to get something like this. Perhaps part of the story we don't know is what else the family ate that day. Perhaps they carried around sandwiches that got too warm. That's only one possibility.