SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Hospital officials say a woman who unknowingly drank iced tea laced with an industrial cleaning solution at a Utah restaurant is starting to recover.
University of Utah hospital officials say Jan Harding’s condition was upgraded Sunday evening to serious.
The 67-year-old woman had been in critical condition since Aug. 10, when she drank the sweetened iced tea at Dickey’s Barbecue in South Jordan, a Salt Lake City suburb. Family attorney Paxton Guymon has said the chemicals caused deep, ulcerated burns in her upper esophagus.
Guymon says Harding is now able to speak, albeit in a strained voice. Her breathing tube was removed over the weekend.
Authorities have said a restaurant employee unintentionally put the heavy-duty cleaner in a sugar bag, and a worker later mistakenly mixed it into the iced tea dispenser.
