The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said in an interview yesterday with Christopher Snowbeck of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that it has not completed its investigation of a summer salmonella outbreak in Pennsylvania, nor has it cleared any company of responsibility.

"We haven’t implicated anyone, nor absolved anyone," said Michael Herndon, an FDA spokesman.

Herndon would not comment directly on a news release issued Thursday by Coronet Foods of Wheeling, West Virginia. that said an FDA report found no objectionable conditions at its processing facility.

A Coronet spokesman said yesterday that the company did not say in its news release that it had been cleared by the FDA.

Coronet distributed sliced Roma tomatoes that were used in sandwiches sold at Sheetz convenience stores and 330 Pennsylvanians who ate the sandwiches got sick with salmonella. The outbreak is thought to have sickened another 80 people in neighboring states.