American milk powder was exposed to dual crisis of hygiene and supply, and nine infants died of milk

Jimu News reporter Huang Jiaqi

Since the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia, many infant formula factories in the United States have escaped the health examination, which indirectly leads to the death of up to nine infants in the United States after eating the milk powder produced by the edible Abbott.

Milk powder shortages appear on the shelves in the US supermarket (Picture Source: Associated Press)

According to the Associated Press reported on June 14, as the new crown epidemic in early 2020 swept the United States, in order to protect employees from infection with the new crown virus, the Food and Drug Administration withdrew a large number of sanitary and safety inspectors, which caused the milk powder factory to escape the number. Thousands of conventional sanitary safety examinations.

Before the outbreak, the US regulatory agency inspected the baby formula milk powder factory at least once a year. But in 2020, they have not checked any factory in the three largest milk powder manufacturers in the United States.

According to reports, the Food and Drug Administration inspected three major formula milk powder manufacturers (Abbott, Lijie Shi and Jiabao) in 2019, but it was not until two and a half years later that they entered these factories to check again.

In February of this year, four infants edible Abbott were infected with bacterial infections after a formula produced in a milk powder factory in Michigan, two of them died. Subsequently, Abbott announced a large -scale recall of milk powder and stopped the production of the factory.

The preliminary inspection results show that when the factory produces and handle the formula milk powder, the factory machine does not keep the surface clean and there is health problems.

The latest documents released by the Food and Drug Administration on June 12 showed that as many as 9 children in the United States died after the infant formula produced by the Michigan factory.

In recent months, under multiple factors such as confusion in supply chain, labor shortage, epidemic stocking and inflation, the United States has faced the dilemma of infant formula milk powder shortage.

And this food safety incident has turned the increasing supply of milk powder in the United States into a comprehensive crisis. Parents are scrambling to find formula milk powder through various channels. In order to solve the "milk powder shortage", Biden also launched the "flight formula" to authorize the Ministry of Defense to use military aircraft to transport foreign milk powder.

"If the Food and Drug Administration conducts inspections during the epidemic, they will have more opportunities to discover these problems during the period of time. Infection is to pay the price. "

Due to the vulnerabilities of the new coronary pneumonia's epidemic situation, the baby's formula milk powder factory inspection occurs, the US Congress and government regulatory agencies are investigating a series of errors that have caused crises. A recent bill requires that the Food and Drug Administration must check the production facilities of the baby formula milk powder factory every six months.

The government's health supervisor has begun to investigate whether the Food and Drug Administration had previously compliant inspections and processing methods of Abbott.

The Food and Drug Administration stated: "Our first task is to solve the urgent needs of infant formula milk powder in the US market. Our team is working on daily life to help achieve this goal."

Baby formula makers have been regarded as "high priority matters" during the epidemic, and preferred milk powder production, but the Food and Drug Administration stated that they also missed about 15,000 sanitary examinations, and only about 5,000 times have been completed.

Food safety experts said that the gap in inspection indicates that the government's response has blind spots. For decades, the supervision of drugs and medical products has been placed on food. Copy the shortage of milk powder.

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