Less than two weeks after a lunch date at a popular sushi restaurant, Donna Ventura said goodbye to her husband and son from her hospital bed.
The retired financial advisor, 64, suffered complete kidney and liver failure and was placed on a ventilator at Bozeman Health hospital, where she spent 13 days fighting for her life against poisoning from uncooked mushrooms.
Donna scribbled on pieces of computer paper with a red magic marker and told her husband Jon and son Christopher, “I’m not sure I can go on much longer,” and to her son, “I love you, Mr. C.”
Donna was one of 51 guests at Dave’s Sushi who became seriously ill and one of two who died after eating a special roll topped with uncooked morels.
Donna Ventura, 64, pictured here between son Christopher left and husband Jon right, died just 13 days after eating raw morels on a specialty sushi roll at a restaurant in downtown Bozeman, Montana
Some of the messages she wrote to Jon and their son included: “I’m not sure I can go on much longer,” “How are we going to make it?”, “I can’t stand the pain ‘ and ‘I love you.’
Morels are generally considered edible, and all tests for pesticides and other toxins on their surfaces were negative.
However, they found that the people who got sick ate raw mushrooms, while those who ate cooked mushrooms did fine.
Toxicity from morel mushrooms is uncommon, but not unheard of. Over the past 15 years, there have been approximately 150 reports of mushroom disease caused by morel mushrooms.
Donna was in severe pain, unable to speak and unable to breathe on her own. In the final written messages to her husband and son, she said she didn’t think she could go on much longer and told them both, “I love you.”
In April 2023, Donna and Jon went to Dave’s Sushi in downtown Bozeman for lunch, where Donna ordered a special roll.
A pleasant lunch date turned into a waking nightmare when Donna had to be loaded into an ambulance and driven to Bozeman Health, where she went into cardiac arrest.
From April 17 to early April 29, Donna was in intensive care, connected to a ventilator because she could not breathe on her own.
The toxins in the mushrooms had caused her liver and kidneys to fail.
The mushrooms turned out to be true morels, which, compared to the ‘false’ variety, tend to contain lower levels of the toxin hydrazine and are poisonous when consumed raw.
Eating foods containing hydrazine can cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and abdominal pain that can inflame and damage organs.
The compound causes direct damage to kidney and liver cells, disrupts their ability to cleanse the blood and destroys red blood cells, leading to inflammation and failure.
In a new interview with KBZK news in Bozeman, Jon Ventura, Donna’s husband of 34 years, described her final days.
Her entire body ached, her skin was tight from the massive fluid buildup in her system, and she could no longer breathe independently of a ventilator.
Dave’s Sushi in Bozeman, Montana, served uncooked morels on one of its specialty rolls in April 2023, sickening a total of 51 people, sending four to the hospital and killing two.
Donna with son Christopher as a boy
Jon gave her paper and a red marker to write down what she wanted to say.
Some of the messages she wrote to Jon and their son included: “I’m not sure I can go on much longer,” “How are we going to make it?”, “I can’t stand the pain .’
Jon said, “And the last couple she wrote was for me and our son, where she wrote, “I love you,” and for our son, “I love you, Mr. C.”
Donna made the decision to decline a feeding tube and died on the morning of April 29, before Jon could go to the hospital to say goodbye.
A few months after her death, the state and Gallatin County health departments concluded an investigation that found that between March 28 and April 17, 2023, another 50 people who ate morels at Dave’s Sushi became ill. Four, including Donna, were hospitalized.
Donna was the second of two customers to die after dining at Dave’s. William Lewis, 74, of Toston, Montana, died just one day after dining there, on April 18.
‘TILL DEATH DO US PART: Donna and her husband on their wedding day
Jon said, “I told my wife on her deathbed that one of my jobs would be to hold those accountable for what they did to her. I’m very concerned about the people who eat at Dave’s Sushi.”
Jon is suing the restaurant for wrongful death, as is Mr. Lewis’s family. Dave closed temporarily in April, but reopened the following month.
Jon told Montana Free Press: “What baffles me, honestly, is that the restaurant is making statements about how we are in their thoughts and prayers. Real? That level of hypocrisy is hurtful, painful.”
Since the deaths of Ms. Ventura and Mr. Lewis, and the spate of gastrointestinal illnesses, the local health department has found nearly two dozen other violations at the sushi restaurant, including unsafe temperatures in a sample of raw fish and problems with the restaurant’s dishwasher. restaurant.
At the restaurant the mushrooms were served uncooked, marinated in a cold liquid but not cooked.
An FDA investigation later found that other restaurants that purchased mushrooms from the same distributor had cooked theirs before serving them, and no customers became ill.
Researchers from the CDC: ‘On April 8, the morels were served partially cooked: a hot cooked sauce was poured over the raw morels, after which they were marinated for 75 minutes.
“On April 17, the morels were marinated uncooked and cold before being served.”
Researchers found that people who ate the less-cooked mushrooms on April 17 were about nine times more likely to get sick than people who ate the partially cooked mushrooms on April 8.