FDA widens peanut butter warning
Fri Feb 16, 2007 11:11pm ET163
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - All Peter Pan peanut butter bought since May 2006 should be discarded, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Friday in a statement broadening its warning about salmonella-contaminated peanut butter.
More than 290 people from 39 states have become ill in the food poisoning outbreak, and 46 have been hospitalized, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.
ConAgra Foods Inc., which makes Peter Pan, said earlier it was checking the source of the contamination, which may have also affected the Great Value label peanut butter it makes for retailer Wal-Mart.
The FDA had said on Wednesday that certain batches of Peter Pan butter may contain salmonella and that all had a product code on the lid of the jar beginning with 2111.
The FDA said the suspect Great Value peanut butter also could be identified by the 2111 code.
The CDC has identified the strain of bacteria as Salmonella Tennessee, one of many strains of salmonella bacteria.
They can cause nausea, diarrhea and other ill effects, but usually the sickness clears up on its own in less than a week.
"Although Great Value peanut butter with the specified product code has not been linked by CDC to the cases of Salmonella Tennessee infection, the product is manufactured in the same plant as Peter Pan peanut butter and, thus, is believed to be at similar risk of contamination," the FDA said in a statement.
Fri Feb 16, 2007 11:11pm ET163
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - All Peter Pan peanut butter bought since May 2006 should be discarded, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Friday in a statement broadening its warning about salmonella-contaminated peanut butter.
More than 290 people from 39 states have become ill in the food poisoning outbreak, and 46 have been hospitalized, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.
ConAgra Foods Inc., which makes Peter Pan, said earlier it was checking the source of the contamination, which may have also affected the Great Value label peanut butter it makes for retailer Wal-Mart.
The FDA had said on Wednesday that certain batches of Peter Pan butter may contain salmonella and that all had a product code on the lid of the jar beginning with 2111.
The FDA said the suspect Great Value peanut butter also could be identified by the 2111 code.
The CDC has identified the strain of bacteria as Salmonella Tennessee, one of many strains of salmonella bacteria.
They can cause nausea, diarrhea and other ill effects, but usually the sickness clears up on its own in less than a week.
"Although Great Value peanut butter with the specified product code has not been linked by CDC to the cases of Salmonella Tennessee infection, the product is manufactured in the same plant as Peter Pan peanut butter and, thus, is believed to be at similar risk of contamination," the FDA said in a statement.