Chipotle Is Retraining All Of Its Workers Following Latest Food Safety Incident
In the aftermath of Chipotle’s biggest food poisoning outbreak in history, the chain’s employees will be undergoing nationwide retraining on food safety, in an attempt to help the issue.
The company’s most recent foodborne illness scare in Powell, Ohio, led to over 700 self-reported illnesses. According to Nation’s Restaurant News, local health department officials later confirmed the actual number of related cases to be 674, still the most ever for a single outbreak tied to Chipotle.
It took them a while to find the cause, but the culprit pathogen was discovered to be Clostridium perfringens, a bacteria that grows well in protein-rich environments and is a common sign of time and temperature abuse.
New Chipotle CEO Brian Niccol has since issued a statement announcing the nationwide retraining.
“While this incident impacted only one restaurant, Chipotle field leadership will be retraining all restaurant employees nationwide beginning next week on food safety and wellness protocols,” Niccol said.
These will include an expansion of those policies, including “a recurring employee knowledge assessment of our rigorous food safety standards,” according to the statement.
The last time Chipotle performed such a massive retraining was in early 2016, when every location nationwide closed for a few hours on one day to talk food safety. It is unclear whether a similar action will happen when the new training sessions begin next week.
