A cheese manufacturer has slammed a link between one of its products and an E Coli outbreak which caused 19 people to fall ill.

Health Protection Scotland (HPS) has said Dunsyre Blue, produced by Errington Cheese in Lanarkshire, is "the most likely cause" of the E Coli O157 cases across the country.

All those affected by the outbreak started suffering symptoms in the first fortnight of July and are now recovering at home.

Humphrey Errington described the link to his firm's product as "outrageous" after independent microbiological tests came back negative.

He said the short timescale of the outbreak and a lack of evidence the cheese was contaminated led him to believe something else had caused the illness.

When the cases first came to light last month, the firm carried out a voluntary recall of two batches, C22 and D14, which HPS advised people not to eat.

Errington Cheese said it had sold more than 450kg of those batches, estimating that up to 18,000 people would have consumed those products.

An independent microbiologist has since tested six samples from D14, all of which have tested negative.

Mr Errington told STV he had been kept "isolated" from updates about the E Coli investigation and his firm's requests for information had been denied.

He said: "We have had an independent microbiologist who looked at all the tests and said we could be assured that there had never been O157 in cheese and milk. It's just awful.

"Because of this drip of alerts coming from [HPS], our biggest customer in London has just stopped ordering Dunsyre Blue.

"Huge numbers of cheese have been returned to us by wholesalers regardless of the batch codes."

He added: "If [HPS] genuinely thought there was a problem with our premises the first thing that authorities would do would be to come with environmental swabs for everything but they haven't even bothered to do that.

"All we're doing is asking them to acknowledge that Dunsyre is not the cheese that has caused this outbreak."

Mr Errington said he was concerned the association with E Coli would affect the reputation of the Scottish cheese industry and would make people lose confidence in HPS investigations.

A statement published on the Errington Cheese website said: "Had it been the cheese, illness would have been widespread."

It added: "We don't know why the incident management team concluded that cheese batches C22 and D14 were responsible for illness as the wholesalers who supplied all the restaurants did not keep a record of which batches went to which customer; any of 10 batches might have been supplied to these restaurants.

"We know from both our and the authorities' tests that D14 was negative for E Coli.

"From what we can gather all cases had an onset of symptoms between July 1 and 15, a two-week period.

"However, our cheese was available over a eight to nine-week period. From this we conclude that the outbreak was more likely to have been caused by something with a shorter shelf life or not by a food at all."

A spokeswoman for HPS said: "The multi-agency incident management team investigating this incident includes representatives of Food Standards Scotland, NHS boards and local authority environmental health teams and is chaired by HPS.

"As is normal practice, the outbreak investigation is being undertaken in line with national guidance, details of which are available on the Scottish Government website.

"The incident management team continues to meet on a regular basis to review and consider all information as it becomes available.

"Based on the detailed information available to the multi-agency team, Dunsyre Blue cheese remains the most likely source of this outbreak, with confirmed cases becoming unwell between July 2 and 15.

"It would not be appropriate to respond in more detail at present as investigations have not yet concluded.

"However, a formal outbreak report will be produced by the incident management team after the investigation is declared over."