Constance Georgostathis, the daughter of an Ohio woman who is currently recovering from a coma following consumption of listeria-tainted Dole salad in January, which claimed one life and made 18 others sick prompting the company to recall bagged greens in 23 states, has filed a federal lawsuit last week accusing the food manufacturer of neglect in failing to fulfill the federal as well as state food safety laws.
Georgostathis has sought unspecified damages for her mother Angeliki "Kiki" Christofield. Christofield. "Testing by the Ohio Department of Health on the same bag of Dole prepackaged salad mix that Mrs. Christofield had consumed showed that it was positive for Listeria," her civil complaint states.
The lawsuit claims that 77-year-old Christofield consumed some of the spinach purchased by her daughter from a Cincinnati-area Kroger on January 20 or 21 some days before. Soon she experienced head and neck pain accompanied by confusion. These symptoms were treated with painkillers; the Courier-Journal reported quoting the lawsuit.
On Jan. 31, Christofield was shifted to a hospital by ambulance and soon fell into a coma that lasted all through February. Subsequent blood and spinal fluid tests revealed brain infection with listeria, which was "indistinguishable from the strain involved in the recent outbreak."
Shortly after this incident, Dole was compelled to recall all salads produced at its Springfield, OH, production facility after a routine government sampling program discovered Listeria monocytogenes in a packaged salad obtained from a retail outlet. On Jan. 21, Dole officials told the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that they had shut down the Springfield plant for investigation and cleaning, Food Safety News reported.
Incidentally, the current operation status at Dole's Springfield salad plant is unknown, as the company spokesman William Goldfield said that Dole's corporate policies do not allow for public comments on pending litigation.
On the other hand, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in its latest update on Feb. 25 that all the victims of listeriosis infections in the United States were aged between 3 and 83 years old.
Meanwhile, Christofield is among the 18 people in the U.S. and 11 in Canada, who, according to local health officials, have been inflicted by listeriosis infections from the same strain of the Listeria monocytogenes that food inspectors detected in packaged salad made at Dole's Ohio facility.
While all the 29 patients were hospitalized, one victim died in the U.S., in addition to three in Canada.
According to Christofield's lawyer Bill Marler, she is now able to sit up and her family says that she can also recognize them. The lawyer further informed that her recovery is largely dependent on whether her brain, swollen by infection, heals. However, people are very hopeful she will turn it around, he added.