April 3, 2013, 4:33 p.m.
There are fears a gastroenteritis outbreak caused by contaminated oysters in Tasmania over the Easter weekend has spread interstate.
Tasmania's Department of Health and Human Services has confirmed more than 60 Tasmanians have gastroenteritis after eating oysters traced to Barilla Bay Seafoods and grown at Dunalley in the state's south.
A spokesman for the department confirmed on Wednesday that the contaminated oysters were also sold in Melbourne and Sydney.
It is believed that up to 20 people in Melbourne have reported the illness, however tests have not yet confirmed if is linked to the Barilla Bay oysters.
"There are reports of Victorian people having gastro," the spokesman said. "There is a smoking gun but as yet there is no direct link proved by testing at this stage."
Barilla Bay Seafoods halted the sale of its oysters on Sunday pending investigations and all potentially contaminated shellfish have been removed from the market.
The contamination is not believed to be related to a sewage spill at nearby Pitt Water and Island Inlet which forced the closure of several leases last week.
However, investigations will continue into how a lease owned by Barilla Bay in a separate growing area came to be contaminated.
The department said the batches of oysters that caused the gastro outbreak were harvested on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday last week and may have been sold up to and including Easter Sunday.
Barilla Bay Seafoods was not available for comment on Wednesday. However, the executive officer for Oysters Tasmania, Tom Lewis, said he believed the contamination was isolated.
"All evidence at the moment is pointing towards just oysters from one lease that were harvested between Monday and Friday of last week. So, it's a really small, isolated incident from everything we know at the moment," he said.
"My feeling is if it was broader than that we would be seeing evidence of that already, and we're not."
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