More than 100 Food Safety Summit attendees confirm food poisoning symptoms after event

BALTIMORE, April 29 (UPI) -- After it was suspected that the food at the Food Safety Summit earlier this month may have been tainted, more than 100 people have confirmed that they suffered from gastroenteritis after attending the event at the Baltimore Convention Center. Attendees reported suffering symptoms including diarrhea and nausea, although Maryland state health officials are still unsure what caused the problem.

“None of us are very happy when we hear these things,” convention center executive director Peggy Daidakis told NBC News. “We’re not trying to hide anything. If there is something, we’ll take the corrective measures.”

About 400 of the summit’s 1,500 guests have not reported about their health, so the number of people who became ill after the event may be even higher.

“We are working on evaluating possible exposures and doing testing at the Maryland state public health laboratory to attempt to identify an agent,” officials said in a letter to attendees.

Convention guests included staff from the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as well as from companies like McDonald’s, Chiquita and Tyson.