First possible E.coli case in Spain, as world bans Spanish vegetables

Andalucia Agriculture chiefs

SAN SEBASTIAN (Agencies) The first case of E.coli to appear in Spain is that of a man in San Sebastian who had travelled recently to Germany and Czech and who has been in the intensive care unit at a local hospital since his return on May 20. The death toll in Germany has risen to 14, and the number of cases in hospital to 329. In the meantime, most of Northern Europe and a good part of the rest of the world have banned vegetables from Spain, whose Environmental Minister, Rosa Aguilar, said, "The German government needs to understand that it is not correct to blame Spain," after a meeting with local farmers who are suffering heavy losses. Farmers in the province of Almeria alone calculate their daily losses at some 6 million euros as importers cancel orders not only of cucumbers both also other vegetables and fruit. Aguilar said Spain had acted quickly to carry out the scientific analysis of the greenhouses where the cucumbers blamed for the outbreak came. The European Commission said Monday it still did not know the source of the outbreak, and hoped to have the results of tests available by Wednesday at the very latest.