Dozens of Russians get food poisoning from shwarma, 10 hospitalized

35 Russians reportedly got food poisoning from eating shwarma, sparking a criminal investigation opened by Russian authorities on Thursday.

The popular Middle Eastern meat dish, typically made from lamb or chicken, was served at a cafe called "I Want Shwarma" in Bratsk, a city in Russia's Irkutsk region. Authorities said it sent 10 of those who fell ill to the hospital.

The governor of the Irkutsk region Igor Kobzev wrote about the incident on his Telegram channel.

"Mass poisoning in Bratsk. 10 people were hospitalized after visiting a cafe. Five of them are children, they are now in the Bratsk Children's Clinical Hospital. Five adults are being treated in the infectious diseases department of hospital No. 5. The number of people in need of medical care is being specified," he said. 

Criminal investigation launched on shwarma food poisoning

Russia's state-run news agency RIA Novosti reported that a criminal case has been opened, "on the grounds of a crime under part 1 of article 238 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (production, storage, sale of products that do not meet safety requirements)." 

In 2020, a 5-year-old child died and 700 other Jordanians were admitted to the hospital after eating rotten shwarma at a food stand in the Jordanian capital of Amman.

The fast food version of shawarma is sold in many street stalls in Israel and around the Middle East. It comes wrapped inside a kind of flatbread called laffa in Arabic and in Hebrew. Many people around the world rely on cheap street food for their daily meals, and affordable food is usually a good thing. But perhaps people should be more careful when offered a deal that sounds too good to be true.

Tobias Siegel contributed to this report.