(AP) — An employee of the consumer protection authority of Lower Saxony examines a sample of sprouts from a farm in the Uelzen area in Oldenburg, northern Germany, Monday, June 6, 2011.
In a surprising U-turn, German officials said the initial tests provided no evidence that sprouts from an organic farm in northern Germany were the cause of the country's deadly E. coli outbreak. The Lower-Saxony state agriculture ministry said 23 of 40 samples from the sprout farm suspected of being behind the outbreak have tested negative for the highly aggressive, "super-toxic" strain of E. coli bacteria. It said tests were still under way on the other 17 sprout samples. (AP Photo/dapd, Markus Hibbeler)
