KIROTV.com - Money - Outdated Baby Formula Found On Store Shelves
Bebe Emerman KIRO 7 Consumer Investigator
POSTED: 3:38 pm PST February 16, 2005
"Many mothers breast-feed their infants, but many others can't or choose to use prepared baby formula to give their babies the nourishment they need. Consumer Investigator Bebe Emerman exposes why the packaged formula you're feeding your infant may be dangerous to his or her health. Millions of Washington babies depend on formula as their main source of nutrition. That's why it's the only food the government says must be pulled off store shelves after a certain date. But, as our investigation reveals, too often, local stores are ignoring the rules and selling old, outdated formula -- and there doesn't seem to be anyone around to stop them...."


MORE ON THIS STORY
Info from FDA
Outdated Forumal Info


Like many moms, Martha Ritola depends on commercial infant formula to keep 5-month-old Sydney happy and healthy.

'It's easy for me to feed her, it's easy for dad to feed her,' Ritola said. 'It's very accessible. You can go to about any stores including drug stores and they're going to have some kind of either generic or name brand formula that you're going to assume is safe for your baby.'

But is it? We sent our hidden camera into 28 grocery, drug and variety stores all over the Puget Sound region.

We combed the shelves, checking pull dates on dozens of cans of prepared infant formula.

What we found was scary.

Six of the stores had out-of-date formula for sale. That's more than 20%. In some cases, it was just a few weeks.

But hold on! The date on one can reads Jan 1, 2004, but we bought it in May -- which making it almost six months past the pull date.

'Considering that formula is the supplement for a child I guess that's the most upsetting thing,' said Rebecca Porter.

We asked members of this new parents group what they thought of our findings."