If you’ve ever had food poisoning, you know just how much it sucks. You go from fiercely hot to freezing cold in seconds thanks to an unbearable fever. Every muscle and bone in your body hurts. You puke. You can’t leave the bathroom thanks to diarrhea. You lose your appetite and don’t really want to eat for days. You get ferociously dehydrated. You can barely move. It SUCKS.
It’s happened to me twice. The first time was the sickest I’ve been in my life — while traveling in India and eating some questionable-looking paneer (cheese) that I definitely shouldn’t have eaten. I ended up in the hospital with that one after shitting my brains out on a New Delhi train coming back from Agra. I had a 103 degree fever and sucked down two (maybe even three? I forget) IVs of fluid. The other time after getting a bad batch of penne al vodka at a restaurant near my apartment in NYC. That one was solved by drinking two red Gatorades in a walk-in clinic’s office.
According to the Minnesota Department of Health, a number of Chipotle restaurants in Minnesota suffered from a salmonella outbreak starting in August. 32 of the 45 victims “ate or likely ate at 17 different Chipotle restaurant locations” in the Twin Cities Metro. The press release alleges that “produce” may be a source of the outbreak. The Minnesota Department of Health also adds this:
“Between Aug. 16 and Aug. 26, Chipotle served more than 560,000 customers in Minnesota and has taken every appropriate measure to ensure that it is safe to eat in its restaurants. Investigators are confident that ongoing transmission at Chipotle as part of this outbreak has ended.”
Pssshew. You can feel better about that chicken burrito bowl you had for lunch.
But one lady got so violently ill from eating at Chipotle that she’s now suing the restaurant, seeking damages for “general pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, medical expenses, emotional distress, and pharmaceutical expenses,” according to Business Insider. BI has a summary of the lawsuit, which alleges that the plaintiff suffered from violent diarrhea after eating at a Chipotle.
According to the lawsuit, Beck started developing stomach cramping and diarrhea five days after eating at a Minneapolis Chipotle.
Her symptoms grew worse over the next several days and she was admitted to a hospital on August 23, where she was treated with IV fluid for severe dehydration, according to the lawsuit.
She says she was released from the hospital nine days later on September 1, but had to return the following day because of blood clots in both her arms.
Her second hospital stay lasted until September 4, the lawsuit stated. Beck says she has continued to suffer from diarrhea and blood clots since then.
Beck is seeking unspecified damages for general pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, medical expenses, emotional distress, and pharmaceutical expenses, according to the lawsuit.
Feeling like you can’t get off the toilet for a couple hours when you have food poisoning is bad enough. Feeling like you can’t get off the toilet for FIVE DAYS, however, has to be a living hell.
As the joke goes…