As a public service to our readers, we offer the following news item:
The City Department of Health Services has announced the discovery of several cases of food contamination in the area. The culprit appears to be a microbe, a potentially fatal large, gram-negative bacillus with features consistent with the botulinum toxin-producing Clostridium genus which has contaminated a number of jars of baby food manufactured locally by Healthy Infant Organic Foods, Ltd.
Healthy Infant has issued an immediate recall of jars with lot numbers 00001 through 07659 manufactured between November 2006 and April 2007. This accounts for over 50,000 containers sold under the brand names Tummy Hugs®, Bright Future® and Mommy’s Sweet Angel®.
Any such jars matching this description should be returned to Healthy Foods ASAP for immediate incineration. Do not, repeat, DO NOT attempt to open the jars without wearing at least Class IV respiratory protective equipment. Consumption of contents is also not advised.
At a press conference held Friday, Chief Health Commissioner Rudolph “Guy†Fenimore stated:
“If any individuals who have had access to the tainted product are seen displaying any of the following signs of illness, do not panic, but take him or her to the closest emergency room for quarantine and a battery of nearly somewhat almost painless tests.
“The symptoms include: drooling, incontinence, fits of crying or screaming, tendency to insert foreign objects into the mouth and incoherent speech.”
When the Healthy Infant Organic Food factory opened its doors last November, it was expected to be an economic shot in the arm to the ailing Bottling District. The factory, located on Bing Road adjacent to the Richard Odgen Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant, currently employs more than 500 local residents. Many of these same workers were devastated with the announcement last October that the Roly-Poly Puppy Foods facility, (then located at the current Healthy Infant plant), would be shut down due to a consistent inability to meet the embarrassingly lax minimum vermin excrement content standards set by the American Association of Pet Food Manufacturers.
Before yesterday’s announcement by the CDHS, Healthy Infant was in the final stages of applying for an IPO of publicly traded stock, and had been courting celebrity endorsements from such luminaries as Valerie Bertinelli, James Woods and veteran character actor Blake Clark. The New York Stock Exchange immediately dropped Healthy Infants’ application for an IPO upon the announcement, and finding any celebrities willing to provide an endorsement now appears unlikely, with the possible exception of Mr. Woods.
– R. Ingraham