The Chipolte conspiracy.......

BILLERICA (CBS) – A Chipotle in Billerica has been shut down temporarily after an employee was diagnosed with norovirus and two others reported similar symptoms.


By late Tuesday, cleanup crews had arrived with sanitation supplies in tow. Customer after customer arrived to find a familiar sign on the door.

“Disappointed they’re closed again,” said customer Tim Wood.

The Chipotle in Billerica voluntarily closed earlier in the day after four employees called out sick. One of those employees tested positive for norovirus, two others are suspected to have the virus. Cases among customers have not been reported.

The Board of Health was immediately notified and work began.

“I think the restaurant is doing everything possible to sanitize and bring everything back to a cleanliness state to reopen,” said Sandra Giroux of the Billerica Board of Health.

But that might not happen until the end of the week at the earliest and those infected employees won’t be allowed back to work until their symptom-free for five days.

“They’re a great company, we love them,” said customer Connor McCarthy. “We come here all the time. I haven’t had any problems with it, I’m sure they’re just looking out for us.”

Health inspectors will be at the restaurant Wednesday morning.

boston.cbslocal.com...

I admit to only working in the food industry for a VERY short time. (McDonalds at 16-17) But I have been around food for all of my life. I have seen some great, clean restaurants, and some nasty ones, that made great food. (also some nasty ones that sucked) But in all that time, I have never heard of a single chain of restaurants having the problems Chipote does. At first, it was possible. Either bad practices, or a bad supplier. They got a bad bit of publicity, closed down, retrained, and cleaned.

Now after all the closing, cleaning, training, you would expect them to emerge stronger and much less likely to ever have issues like this again. But it happened again. And now, yet again. It may be coincidence, it may be a run of really, really bad luck. But it seems a bit deeper than that. It seems like at best, corporate sabotage, and at worst, a company wide conspiracy. the laws of probability just seem to be way against this kind of errors.

I know BFFT is in the food industry, and some others here are as well. (Tadman) I hope that some people with inside knowledge can either explain this, or assist in figuring out how this kind of mistake can continue as it has.

Burritos already assist in cleansing the body, there is no need for any acceleration of the process.

I heard you bleed after having dinner there

Yes, looks like Chipotle is under attack by somebody, very suspicious I'd say.

They only started having these problems after they said they would use only non-gmo foods.
I don't believe in coincidences, not multiples anyway.
Corporate sabotage.
Billions of dollars at stake here, 10's of billions.

I work in a lab, I try and avoid the microbiology department (smells bad). Noro is really really easy to catch. Since it's a virus you don't know you have it until later when the symptoms really kick in.

I think many of the 'mystery illness' on cruise liners a few years ago was noro.

When we get one positive noro, we usually get more from the same 'wing' soon after.

So maybe it is a conspiracy or a plot, but noro does spread quickly (poo hands and vomit... ugh it's awful to think about.)

originally posted by: manuelram16
Yes, looks like Chipotle is under attack by somebody, very suspicious I'd say.

I agree. I think this is a concerted effort to bring them down.

originally posted by: Elton
I work in a lab, I try and avoid the microbiology department (smells bad). Noro is really really easy to catch. Since it's a virus you don't know you have it until later when the symptoms really kick in.

I think many of the 'mystery illness' on cruise liners a few years ago was noro.

When we get one positive noro, we usually get more from the same 'wing' soon after.

So maybe it is a conspiracy or a plot, but noro does spread quickly (poo hands and vomit... ugh it's awful to think about.)

I can see that aspect to a point, but why has it not made it past the one restaurant chain? that part seems way too strange.

a reply to: Elton

It was when it came about, that 2 different forms of the virus appeared. Virology is not my forte. But viruses do mutate. Though viruses are not live. I do realize that it's the host that actually goes through changes however.

a reply to: network dude

I honestly don't know, it's really easy to spread (sadly, because so many people are not so good at hygiene, I suspect...)

I think they use gloves at Chipotle (at least in my town) so that may mitigate the spread.

a reply to: Elton

The employees do wear gloves. It'seems the original handlers at the farms that may not. And the the lack of good washing of the food from there.😷

It IS weird... my first foray to the local Chipotle left me married to a toilet for two weeks... and we're talking mere minutes after taking a bite, before I finished the food...which told me it couldn't be connected.

So maybe a curse? Heh...well, I'm clueless and it IS some bad luck as I've spent a few years in the food industry and my father was a big wig at a megacorp for food and know stuff about food born pathogens... and this IS either confirmation bias and bad luck, horrible suppliers and handlers, or corporate sabotage.

a reply to: Elton

If you worked in the lab putting in Noro and you accidentally infected yourself....then, my friend you would have wonderful spells of the river rapids Diarrhea and be puking your guts out...then we would know you were behind the conspiracy!!!

Side note:

Signs and symptoms of norovirus infection include:
Nausea.
Vomiting.
Abdominal pain or cramps.
Watery or loose diarrhea.
Malaise.
Low-grade fever.
Muscle pain.

"If you come down with a norovirus infection, you'll probably go from being completely healthy to feeling absolutely miserable within a day or two after being exposed to the virus. Typical symptoms include nausea, vomiting (more often in children), watery diarrhea (more often in adults), and stomach cramps." - WebMD

originally posted by: Elton
I work in a lab, I try and avoid the microbiology department (smells bad). Noro is really really easy to catch. Since it's a virus you don't know you have it until later when the symptoms really kick in.

I think many of the 'mystery illness' on cruise liners a few years ago was noro.

When we get one positive noro, we usually get more from the same 'wing' soon after.

So maybe it is a conspiracy or a plot, but noro does spread quickly (poo hands and vomit... ugh it's awful to think about.)

and to further this discussion, I ask this question, how many other fast food places have employees with "poo hands and vomit"??.....chipotles can't be the only place where this is happening.

a reply to: Skywatcher2011

No noro yet, I do my best to avoid running routine noro and cdiff tests.

I promise I do run the stats though...

I saw an article that theorized part of the problem is where Chipotle is sourcing their ingredients. The contaminants may be at the farm level - raw veggies, etc. So they aren't being washed thoroughly and since Chipotle doesn't really nuke their foods and the veggies aren't "resistant", there may be a higher likelihood of spreading certain food borne illnesses.

While I like Chipotle, I personally think they company has grown too big for its' own good. I know they are public and growth is always on their mind, but I don't think it is possible to truly run a company sourcing local ingredients and serving high quality food with thousands of locations. At some point, a company gets too big and loses what made them great in the first place. Their growth will be their down fall. They don't need to be on every street corner.

Didn't Whole Foods and Aldi's also announce they were going GMO free?
Yet no huge outbreaks in either of those chains?

a reply to: network dude

I have been there one time. I didn't like the food and I found it to be overpriced. Not sure why anyone goes there.

Though, it would be easy to cause all of these outbreaks purposefully if someone like Monsanto wanted to.

originally posted by: reldra
a reply to: network dude

I have been there one time. I didn't like the food and I found it to be overpriced. Not sure why anyone goes there.

Though, it would be easy to cause all of these outbreaks purposefully if someone like Monsanto wanted to.

I go there for the taste, and I have found that their meat is not loaded with gristle and fat hidden under sauce, like I've had from many other Mexican restaurants.....the "bowls" are the best , and here the cost is about 9 bucks with guacamole added...throw in a IPA beer from my fridge and I'm in hog heaven.....geez, my mouth is already watering

a reply to: Edumakated

I tend to concur on this aspect. How many people today remember a time before the use of pesticides, GMO, etc... foodstuffs? These viral and bacterial infections were all commonplace back then. That was one of the initial reasons to begin those programs to improve the health of the food chain. However, over the decades it has morphed into a money-making venture where profit is king.

"All Natural" means it can contain the things that can make you sick and/pr die. These pathogens, however nasty, are natural after all.

originally posted by: Krakatoa
a reply to: Edumakated

I tend to concur on this aspect. How many people today remember a time before the use of pesticides, GMO, etc... foodstuffs? These viral and bacterial infections were all commonplace back then. That was one of the initial reasons to begin those programs to improve the health of the food chain. However, over the decades it has morphed into a money-making venture where profit is king.

"All Natural" means it can contain the things that can make you sick and/pr die. These pathogens, however nasty, are natural after all.

This was my thinking as well and the article I read confirmed it. People forget that our food supply chain has a lot of safety features built into it and one of those features is GMO whether we want to admit it or not along with how food is processed. Large food processing operations spend a lot ensuring the food is not contaminated and resistant. This is why milk, juice, etc are pasteurized.

While going "au natural" has its benefits, one of the draw backs is that you are more likely to see some type of contamination, particularly when it comes to foods that are not cooked. Chipotle serves a ton of salsa, gauc, etc. Since all the food is being sourced from smaller food operations and not as much "processing" there is bound to be more opportunities for food borne illnesses to slip through. In addition, when factor in the scale of Chipotle, it is bound to happen sooner or later.

No other fast food restaurant is really using Chipotle's model on the same scale. Competitors food is either being nuked or heavily processed off site.

I am a firm believer that many businesses have "natural size" that gives the right level of service and quality. Chipotle's model is wonderful. I wrote a business plan when I was in college for a similar "fast casual" concept in the early 90s. The problem is that this model cannot work well with thousands of restaurants imho. You begin to lose quality, focus, and service.

My prediction is that Chipotle management is going to realize this and will eventually take the company back to being private so they don't have unrealistic growth pressures from Wall Street.