ENDEAVOUR HILLS HALLAM DOVETON
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/DandenongJournal
Tuesday, 8 August, 2023
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Smith responds to IBAC
Homeless week event
Thunder meets A-League champ
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Our ‘worst’ road
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Connie set for battle Connie Psihogios, 14, from Greater Dandenong Table Tennis Association, is rallying herself for Olympic qualifiers next month in the hope of representing Australia at table tennis at the 2024 Games. For more, turn to page 14
Picture: STEWART CHAMBERS
I Foods sues health department and slams Brett Sutton for its ...
‘Reckless’ closure By Cam Lucadou-Wells In a long-awaited Supreme Court trial, Dandenong South commercial kitchen I Cook Foods has claimed that it was closed down with “reckless indifference”. ICF is suing the Department of Health and Human Services for alleged misfeasance in the shutdown and destruction of its family business in early 2019.
Then-Acting Chief Health Officer Brett Sutton ordered the closure as part of an investigation into the death of an 86-year-old listeriainfected patient at Knox Private Hospital. On 2 August, ICF’s barrister Marcus Clarke KC told the court that Dr Sutton acted with “reckless indifference” to whether ICF’s food was “unsafe” or “unsuitable” as well as to the likely harm to the business. Dr Sutton should not have acted until there
were more detailed lab test results on ICF food samples, Mr Clarke argued. Instead “they’ve jumped before getting the report”, Mr Clarke said. At the time, Dr Sutton knew there were six food samples with listeria mono (LM) collected from the ICF kitchen, and that ICF supplied sandwiches to Knox Private, Mr Clarke said. The pending lab results were whether the LM concentration levels were ‘safe’ at ICF and if the LM was a genomic match with the listeria
found in the patient. Mr Clarke told the court that listeria is “ubiquitous” in the environment. “It’s absolutely imperative to get enumeration before deciding it’s safe or unsafe”. According to Australian New Zealand Food Standards, the safe LM level in ready-to-eat foods is less than 100 colony-forming units per gram (cfu/g). Continued page 4
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