Food Poisoning Law Blog : Food Poisoning Lawyer & Attorney : PritzkerLaw : Food Safety, Outbreaks & Recalls

There's still a chance that more people will become infected in the Nestle E. coli outbreak, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has issued its final update on the cookie dough outbreak that has sickened at least 80 individuals -- mostly young women -- since early March.

Of the 80 confirmed cases, 35 people have been hospitalized and 10 developed hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS), a serious complication that results in kidney damage and can trigger other major health problems. E. coli O157:H7 infections such as those experienced in the Nestle Toll House refrigerated dough outbreak can be deadly, but no deaths were reported in this outbreak.

According to the CDC, the disease spread over 31 states. The biggest clusters were found in Minnesota (8); Illinois (7); Washington (6); Colorado (6); California (5); Massachusetts (4); Ohio (3) and Texas (3).

Pritzker Olsen attorneys, one of the leading food safety and food poisoning law firms in the country, is currently representing E. coli O157:H7 victims and is accepting cases from the Nestle Toll House outbreak.. Out firm has the resources and experience to take on companies as big as Nestle to make recoveries for victims who ate raw cookie dough contaminated with this potentially lethal pathogen.

The Food and Drug Administration and the CDC continue to warn consumers not to eat any varieties of the recalled Nestle Toll House refrigerated cookie dough due to the risk of contamination with E. coli O157:H7. This includes Nestle Toll House cookie dough that does not say "New Batch'' on the labeling.

On June 29, the FDA  announced a finding of E. coli O157:H7 in a sample of prepackaged and previously unopened Nestle Toll House refrigerated cookie dough collected at Nestle's cookie dough plant in Danville, Virginia. Further lab testing showed that the strain in the sample was not the outbreak strain -- so there is still no microbiological smoking gun linking the outbreak to the cookie dough.

But federal officials and state health departments collected strong epidemiological evidence in their interviews with victims -- most of whom said they ate uncooked Nestle Toll House cookie dough before falling ill. To this day, the government warns consumers not even to open the potentially contaminated dough to bake with it, because it could be accidentally ingested or cross-contaminate a kitchen surface.

If you or a loved one were among those sickened in this outbreak, or if you became ill with symptoms of E. coli after eating raw Nestle cookie dough, call an E. coli lawyer at Pritzker Olsen at 1-888-377-8900 (Toll Free) or complete one of our online E. coli compensation consultation forms for a free case consultation.

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By FRED PRITZKER

Minneapolis, July 15, 2009 -- The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced today that Nestle is back in business making and selling refrigerated cookie dought following the Nestle outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 associated with this popular and no doubt profitable product.

As of July 10, 2009, CDC reported that 76 people from 31 states have been infected with the outbreak strain of E. coli O157:H7. As of that date, 35 people had been hospitalized, including 11 with a serious complication call HUS, or hemolytic uremic syndrome. No one has died.

The decision to start selling the product again was made despite the fact that E. coli O157:H7 was found in an unopened package of cookie dough. This strain was not the same as the outbreak strain cultured from stool samples from outbreak survivors -- meaning, most likely, that Nestle cookie dough had a least two separate strains of the deadly pathogen.

Following the June 19, 2009, warning from the FDA not to eat these products, the plant that produced them was shut down, tested and cleaned. According to today's FDA update, part of which is reprinted below, Nestle switched suppliers for the main ingredients and is now back in business producing refrigerated cookie dough:

"However, after a plant shutdown, an investigation, and a cleanup, Nestle is now using main ingredients from new suppliers and is making the cookie dough again. These newly made products are not part of the ongoing recall and are not associated with any illness outbreaks or known contamination. Consumers can identify the newly made products by looking for labels with shields that say "new batch" on them; these batches are not part of the current recall."

It's ironic that by switching suppliers and making a two-word label change, Nestle gets a "do-over'' while the outbreak victims are stuck with a long recovery, medical bills, lost wages and a terrible memory of an illness they will never forget.

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