FOOD POISONING.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 55, Issue 111, 20 February 1935, Page 8

FOOD POISONING.

FATALITY AT BUCKLAND. STATEMENT BY THE CORONER. (Per Press Association). AUCKLAND, A case of fatal food poisoning in the Pukekohe district was investigated by Mr F. K. Hunt-, S.M. (Coroner) at an. inquest concerning the death, on December 13, of Mrs Lucy Nicholson, aged 40, of Buckland. Hazel Fly said that she lived near the Nicholsons. On December 10 she visited their home and assisted Mrs Nicholson with her cooking. Some Spanish cream was made, the ingredients being gelatine, three eggs (which witness thought were duck eggs)j three.pints ofi milk, half a cup of sugar, a pinch of salt, and half a teaspoon of vanilla. The ingredients were taken from a cupboard. Deceased was in good health when she 'spoke with witness oyer the telephone in the evening, but on the following morning her son, her daughter and herself were all ill. 'Mrs Nicholson said they must have been poisoned, and she thought it was meat that was responsible. Later Mrs Nicholson said her husband had .become ill. Witness added that she found four members of the Nicholson family ill in bed on the morning of D'ecembr 12. A doctor subsequently ordered the admission of the victims to hospital. A son of deceased, Eric Nicholson, aged 24, 4 said he had been in hospital for eight*days as a result of food poisoning. With his father, mother and sister he had eaten a meal of roast beef, boiled potatoes, Spanish cream and bahana custard, between 8 and 9 o'clock on the evening of December 10. The Coroner said that Dr. Gilmour (pathologist at the Auckland Hospital) had made a post-mortem examination, which had resulted.in the isolation of the bacillus aertrycke, and the pathologist's opinion was that death was caused by food poisoning. He had examined* other articles, including those obtained from the house, and the bacillus was isolated from the Spanish cream. It was not possible, however, to say from what ingredient in the dish the infection came. The Coroner said that infection might have .been in anything. The weather at the time was hot. He understood the germ had been known to occur in duck eggs. A verdict of death by food poisoning was returned.