May - 2nd boy dies from apparent food poisoning at Fukui yakiniku chain

REFILING: 2nd boy dies from apparent food poisoning at yakiniku chain+

A boy in Fukui has died after eating at an outlet of a yakiniku barbecue restaurant chain where food poisoning caused another boy to die and dozens of others to become ill in Toyama Prefecture since mid- April, health ministry officials said Sunday. 

Following the first boy's death on Friday, Foods Forus Co., which is based in Kanazawa, Ishikawa Prefecture, and runs the Yakiniku-zakaya Ebisu chain, has been temporarily closing all 20 of its outlets in Toyama, Fukui, Ishikawa and Kanagawa prefectures. 

The Toyama prefectural government the same day found that a raw beef dish served at an outlet in the city of Tonami, where the first boy had a meal on April 21, was not edible. The dish is believed to have caused the string of food-poisoning cases. 

A highly toxic O-111 strain of the E. coli bacteria was detected from the boy in Fukui, similarly with the boy in Toyama who began vomiting on April 24 and died Friday at a hospital he was taken to, the officials said. 

The tally of patients suffering from food poisoning at the chain came to 38, including people who ate at an outlet in another Toyama city, Takaoka, the prefectural government said late Saturday.