Saudi Arabia Is the Hot New Destination for Food Poisoning

You and your Cool As Ice-style ragtag crew are three days into drifting down the Red Sea on your rap-themed flotilla, when all of the sudden, Deezer D finally spots the glistening shores of Jeddah. Too bad every single restaurant in town is closed indefinitely.

According to reports by the local media, some 2,745 restaurants in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia's largest seaport on the Red Sea and the second-largest city in the Kingdom, have been forced to close over the last four months due to health violations.

It may be harder than ever to get a decent shawarma these days if you're on your way to Mecca.

Earlier reports have quoted the number of eateries shut down as being as high as 12,000—with a whopping 16,000 food purveyors being cited with violations. Eleven different types of harmful bacteria have been found, a municipal source has been quoted as saying.

The panoply of bacteria found could make even Osmosis Jones weak in the knees. We're talking coliform, Bacillus Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus cereus, and—that old favorite of recent ice cream fame—listeria monocytogenes.

The list of offenses found in the Jeddah restaurants would be familiar to food inspectors worldwide, and include raw foods that have shown "a change in color, smell, texture, or the swelling of their packaging."

In addition, freezers and refrigerators were found to be not cold enough, expiration dates were not displayed, and sources of the food were unknown. Workers were also found to have no health certificates.

The most offensive failing, however, was that food was "prepared, processed and defrosted inside restaurant toilets." Who needs a Cryovac to sous-vide in when you have a skidmark-laden urban hotspring and half a roll of Charmin?

Mohammed Obaid Al-Buqami, spokesman for the municipality of Jeddah, said the municipality is committed to protecting the health of citizens and foreigners, as ordered by Jeddah Mayor Hani Abu Ras. Al-Buqami said inspections would continue.

It wasn't until 2003 that the Saudi Council of Ministers decided to establish the Saudi Food and Drug Authority, or SFDA, in order to better monitor food quality nationwide.

Then, in 2010, Saudi's first International Food Safety Conference took place. Concerns and issues related to the Saudi food industry, with special emphasis on consumer health, were discussed. The recent crackdown may be a natural development of a food safety culture that is burgeoning in the country.

In fact, the government's interest in food safety appears to be part of a pan-Arab movement, as evidenced by February's Arab Forum for Food Safety and Quality, where Arab leaders looked to harmonize food safety policies in the region.

Jeddah Health Affairs Director Sami Badawood has oh-so-prudently stated, "the number of food poisoning cases in Jeddah is cause for alarm." But Arab News reports that over the last month, hospitals in Jeddah "received more than 150 food poisoning cases."

Single women in Saudi Arabia, however, probably will not be shedding tears over the restaurant closings: They can't go to restaurants alone, anyway. Most Jeddah restaurants have a family section and a men-only section, leaving single women at a loss.

Last year, some news reports said that officials and restaurateurs were blaming the ban on single women, who behaved "in a shocking way." These offenses reportedly included flirting and speaking loudly.

Regardless of your position on what should be no brainers like gender equality, it seems as though hungry visitors might want to hold off on that trip to the Kingdom until they can stockpile enough wet wipes to clean several thousand kitchens.