NAN-F-46
Eggs
Seoul, Aug. 15, 2017 (dpa/NAN) Eggs tainted with the insecticide fipronil have been discovered at a production facility in South Korea, the government said on Tuesday, amid an unfolding egg contamination scare in Europe.
The eggs tested positive at a farm east of Seoul, the ministry of agriculture announced, without saying how many eggs were affected and how many made it to market.
The Yonhap news agency reported that the farm used fipronil on the advice on a neighbouring farm.
The ministry ordered a halt to egg production in South Korea until all farms were be tested.
Three of the nation’s top discount grocery chains have stopped selling eggs.
The same insecticide has been at the centre of a health scare that erupted in Europe in July.
So far, 17 countries on the continent have received eggs or egg products tainted with fipronil.
In a new development, the residents of the Belgian city of Malmedy did not let the recent European egg scandal about insecticide contamination hinder them from frying a giant omelette on Tuesday.
Locals used 6,500 eggs for the 4-metre-in-diameter omelette, which was prepared in a giant pan on a public square as part of a year-long tradition in the eastern Belgian city, about 24 km due west from the German border.
Locals wearing tall chef hats and medieval-era fur-trimmed capes used metre-long wooden spoons to stir the egg mixture in the large shallow vat, a video posted on the “Worldwide Brotherhood of the Giant Omelette” Facebook page showed.
According to the brotherhood, the thousands of eggs used for the omelette had been verified as being free of the insecticide.
The dish was distributed to spectators and guests at the event at no cost.
Around 1,000 people were estimated to be in attendance.
Belgium is one of more than a dozen countries where eggs contaminated with fipronil have been distributed.
A common ingredient in veterinary products for getting rid of flies, lice and ticks in animals, the insecticide has been banned from use on animals destined for human consumption. (dpa/NAN)
OYE/AMY
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Edited by Celine-Damilola Oyewole/Abdullahi Yusuf