LONDON, May 9 (Xinhua) -- Soft drinks sold at some of the British cinema chains have been found to contain food poisoning bugs including salmonella, with one drink containing 10,000 times the acceptable level of bacteria, the website of The Times newspaper reported Wednesday.
Tests on drinks served at Cineworld, Odeon and Vue revealed "unacceptable" bacteria levels.
Two drinks from Odeon contained "worrying" pathogens, according to tests commissioned by BBC One's Watchdog Live.
Tony Lewis, head of policy at Britain's Chartered Institute of Environmental Health, said: "I'm concerned we've got an indicator of hygiene failure and potential breakdown in terms of management of hygiene."
The program visited ten branches of each chain, testing the seat fabric, cup holder, a fizzy drink and ice cubes for bacteria.
The worst results were found in the drinks, with seven branches having "unacceptable" levels of bacteria. Many were associated with poor toilet hygiene among workers.
Four of the worst cinema branches were part of the Cineworld chain, with one drink containing 70 times the acceptable level of bacteria.
Vue supplied just one of the offending drinks, but its bacteria count was 100 times the acceptable level.
The final two worst branches were owned by Odeon, with one of their drinks containing 10,000 times above what is considered acceptable, according to the reports.
Odeon and Cineworld said that seats, cup holders and drink dispensers are thoroughly cleaned daily, with ice machines cleaned weekly.
In October 2014, an undercover probe took samples from several British cinemas and tested them for levels of bacteria. Five out of the eight venues tested failed stringent safety tests.
