Agriculture ministers of the 27 European Union member states will meet on Tuesday to discuss a deadly E. coli outbreak that has killed 22 people, an EU official said on Monday.
The virus broke out in Germany's second city Hamburg around three weeks ago and has infected over 2,200 people.
"It has been decided that the EU agriculture and food safety ministers will meet tomorrow at 2 pm [12:00 GMT] in Luxembourg," Marton Hajdu, spokesman for the Hungarian presidency of the European Union, was quoted by AFP news agency as saying. "They will be taking stock of the situation of the EHEC outbreak both from the market perspective and also food safety."
Reports earlier on Monday traced the virus to bean sprouts grown on a farm in Germany's Lower Saxony region, some 70 km (40 miles) south of Hamburg.
Lower Saxony Agriculture Minister Gert Lindemann said on Sunday there was a "very clear trail" leading to a small farm near Uelzen in Lower Saxony that supplied various types of sprouts to restaurants and retailers.
Over 2,200 people have been infected with the enterohaemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) virus and several hundred have developed hemolytic uraemic syndrome (HUS), a severe illness that can lead to kidney disease, coma and death.
MOSCOW, June 6 (RIA Novosti)
