Restaurant staff serves mother, daughters insecticide instead of juice

A woman and her two daughters ended up in hospital after a restaurant staff accidently served them insecticide instead of cranberry juice.

The incident occurred at a local restaurant in Australia’s Nedlands city when Michele Lemin and her two daughters Olivia, 12, and Hannah, 11 drank a small amount of the insecticide, an Australian media outlet reported.

Reports said that the woman and her daughters had initially asked for apple juice, however, they opted for cranberry juice after being told there was no apple juice.

“The waiter brought it over and it looked like cranberry juice,” Lemin told a local media outlet.

According to the mother, her daughters spat out the juice as soon as they took a sip of the liquid.

“They said ‘it’s poisonous’. I said, ‘don’t be silly’,” she added.

To confirm, Michele Lemin tasted the liquid and she too spat it out.

The woman’s husband, Marcus, a chemical engineer, realised that the liquid his daughters and wife had just consumed was not cranberry juice and demanded to see the bottle.

“We were told ‘it’s just old cranberry juice, we’ll give you a new one’,” he said.

However, on his insistence, the bottle of the liquid was brought to them.

“My husband grabbed it and looked at it and he said ‘it’s citronella oil mixed with insect repellent —you’ve poisoned them’,” Lemin said.

The family took pictures of the bottle which was labelled Plus Bifenthrin and carried a warning saying that it is harmful if swallowed, inhaled, or absorbed through skin.

“The girls were crying. There was instant burning because they swallowed it. They spat some out but they had also swallowed it. I had swallowed it too and the taste was awful,” the woman said.

Meanwhile, she said that the waiter who poured the drinks was apologetic and distraught.

Following the discovery, the couple rushed their daughters to a nearby hospital as they had already started displaying symptoms including burning, tingling in their arms and headaches.

“As they’re being looked after I started feeling ill. I felt really drowsy. My stomach was burning, I had a headache. And the nurse said ‘you need to go to Charles Gairdner (Hospital), which was across the road,” the mother said.

According to authorities, the family went to emergency departments at PCH and Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital where they were observed for several hours before being discharged.