Moscow health authorities reported a sharp rise in violations of sanitary and hygiene standards by city food stores and restaurants in July, when they closed down 118 establishments and handed out fines amounting to nearly 250 million rubles (about $57,000).


Officials said the monthly number of such cases has increased by 20 percent.


"More than a half of Moscow food stores and restaurants don't meet necessary sanitary and hygiene requirements," said Natalya Sukhinina of the Moscow epidemiological center. She named insanitary storage conditions and the failure to keep to sell-by dates on perishables as among the main violations, as well as "sanitary ignorance" at some food enterprises.


"At the end of July, the Yegoryevsky meat factory in the Moscow region produced sausage and pelmeni from beef infected with anthrax," she said. The beef came from the Tambov region where one case of anthrax had already been reported. No cases have been reported yet in Moscow or the Moscow region.


Officials at the Moscow-region epidemiological center warned that the sausage and pelmeni in question had not all been accounted for, and could be in any of the numerous uncontrolled markets across the Moscow region.


Two cases of cholera were reported in Moscow on Tuesday by the city epidemiological center. The victims, both watchmen at a Moscow parking lot, had eaten apples, pears and green peppers brought from Moldova. Sukhinina said all necessary steps were taken to prevent the epidemic from spreading.


Igor Nadezhdin of Moscow's health department said fresh fruit and vegetables were the main cause of digestive diseases in the city. He said more than 500 people in Moscow get food poisoning each week, although this represented a drop of 15 percent from last year.


"It's hard to bring charges against food stores and restaurants that sell low-quality food," said Svetlana Kulnitskaya of the Consumers' Union. "A customer must present a whole bunch of documents, including a medical analysis and proof of purchase. In some cases, even eyewitnesses are required. As regards municipal markets, it's absolutely hopeless."