LENEXA Kan. Owners of the Mi Ranchito restaurant here, which has been closed since Sunday when a mysterious illness hit at least 20 guests, said Wednesday they have corrected the problem believed by some health and water department officials to have caused the outbreak: improperly installed drink machine lines.
However, the operators added that in accordance with a state mandate they will leave the establishment closed until their company and health officials are certain they have correctly identified the source of the problem and eliminated it.
The shuttered restaurant is one of six owned by Mi Ranchito LLC of Lenexa. Sunday’s incident, which reportedly sent some of the guests stricken with nausea, vomiting and dizziness to the hospital for treatment, but not overnight stays, followed a similar problem Aug. 11 that sickened five guests, state officials said.
In a statement issued yesterday, company co-founders Rulber Dela Torre and Armando Dela Torre said, “The [initial] reported cause of illness affecting at least 20 patrons of the Mi Ranchito restaurant at 13000 W. 95th Street on August 30th was poisoning that resulted from a chemical reaction between carbonated water and copper tubing.”
They added: “The problem health and water department officials identified initially as the likely cause of contamination has been remedied by a licensed plumbing company with the installation of additional backflow devices designed to prevent carbonated water from backflowing into the copper tubing.”
The restaurateurs went on to say that, while there had been no bouts of unexplained illness at their other restaurants, they nevertheless employed the plumbing company that did the work in Lenexa to inspect the other five Mi Ranchito locations to make certain there are no other potential backflow problems.
“In the meantime, we are continuing to work with local and state health officials to be 100 percent certain that the initially identified cause of the illnesses was in fact correct,” the pair said. They explained that, in keeping with an order by the Kansas Department of Agriculture, the Lenexa restaurant will remain closed until more thorough testing is completed and that any and all corrective measures are taken to assure that neither customers nor staff is at risk.
Maggie Thompson, director of communications for the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, said tests on clinical specimens collected following the fist bout of sickness at the Lenexa restaurant Aug. 11 failed to identify any of the bacterial toxins normally turned up in foodborne illness cases. As a result, she said, state investigators, in the aftermath of the second outbreak, are conducting a number of different tests.
Thompson also noted that no definitive conclusion about the cause of Sunday’s outbreak had been reached as of Tuesday, because not all of the people sickened over the weekend had consumed a carbonated beverage.
The Dela Torres said the tests being conducted at the Lenexa restaurant this week included those on water and carbonated water from the beverage machines, food samples and fresh produce used in food preparation and salsa. In addition, they said, health officials are evaluating blood tests of patrons who suffered illness.
Results of the latest tests are expected to be back in two weeks, the restaurateurs said.
“Mi Ranchito takes its responsibility for the health and safety of customers and employees seriously. We deeply regret that any valued patron became ill after dining in our Lenexa restaurant,” the Dela Torres’ said in their statement. The two added that they were “grateful for the kind comments and words of support we have received from a number of our frequent patrons.”
Contact Alan J. Liddle at [email protected]