After concluding that there is no longer a safety risk, the U.S. government announced on Tuesday that it has ended its investigation into an E. coli incident linked to McDonald’s Quarter Pounder hamburgers.
According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the incident, which started in late October, infected at least 104 people across 14 states, including 34 hospitalized individuals. In Colorado, four persons experienced a potentially fatal kidney disease complication, and one person passed away.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, state health authorities, and the FDA, which carried out the inquiry, connected the incident to yellow onions supplied by California-basedIn Colorado, Kansas, Wyoming, and other states, McDonald’s locations serve raw Quarter Pounders. On October 22, Taylor Farms started a voluntary yellow onion recall.
Colorado’s federal and state health officials investigated onions and environmental samples, but they were unable to identify the strain of E. coli that caused the illnesses. However, they came to the conclusion that the incident was most likely caused by recalled yellow onions.
The FDA stated in a statement on Tuesday that McDonald’s has stopped distributing recalled onions and that there doesn’t seem to be a persistent food safety issue associated with this outbreak.
Due to the outbreak, McDonald’s temporarily stopped serving Quarter Pounders in one-fifth of its locations in the United States. Last month, the business resumed serving Quarter Pounders with sliced onions at all of its U.S. locations after locating a new supplier.
Demand has been harmed by the outbreak, though. McDonald’s announced in mid-November that it would invest $100 million to entice people back to its restaurants, with $65 million going directly to the franchisees that have been most negatively impacted.
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