10 Lidl staff on antibiotics as worker gets TB diagnosis

TEN staff members at Lidl are undergoing courses of antibiotics after a colleague was diagnosed with pulmonary TB, the store has confirmed.

The HSE and Lidl have sought to reassure the public about the safety of shopping at a branch of the supermarket in Carrigaline, Co Cork after it emerged that a staff member informed management in November that they had been diagnosed with TB.

Lidl contacted healthcare professionals and offered voluntary screenings to employees. They also facilitated time off for the tests.

In a statement Lidl said that there was absolutely no risk to the general public and there was no evidence to suggest anyone contracted TB from working in the store.

‘To date, the only person diagnosed with active TB is the employee who brought this to our attention and this person has been on sick leave since then. Following on from the screening, ten additional team members were classed as latent.

‘Latent means that the condition is

‘Absolutely no risk to general public’

not active, you cannot infect other people and the person is not classed as a health concern.”

Employees with latent TB are undergoing preventative treatment and are on antibiotics to prevent them from developing active TB. A second round of screening is planned for mid January.

The HSE has also confirmed that no active case of the disease has been identified. The contact time with customers would have been insufficient to develop the condition.

TB is an infection caused by slowgrowing bacteria that grow best in areas of the body that have lots of blood and oxygen. That’s why it is most often found in the lungs.

The infection requires prolonged and close contact in order to spread from person to person which means the greatest risk is to people who live in the same household.